


Round Robin October 2020

by sinsrfun10



Series: Round-Robin Stories by Month [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Amendments, Gen, Random - Freeform, Round Robin, Rules, boom - Freeform, calenlas, clauses are rules, crackfic, dialect switch, dont push the button, i dont have a tattoo, laicolasse, original fic - Freeform, pain bad, redacted, samantha - Freeform, sister-inflicted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:22:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 34,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26780593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinsrfun10/pseuds/sinsrfun10
Summary: This story began with the words "Don't push the button." It devolved from there.This is a round-robin story written for the month of October in the year 2020 by three writers who get hopelessly inspired to write multiple things at once. This is the beginning of a monthly story writing challenge. Every chapter will be dated by what is written on a given day.Follow the characters Emilia, Gregory, and Samantha on what we writers have inflicted upon them.Comments made while writing this fic: “What?!?!” “A hot pink buck knife?” “When did she go gangsta?” “What did you do?!?!” “I had plans but Emilia said no.” “I had plans but then her plot ruined it.” “What did you redact?!?!” “I had something happen.” “You write strange last names.” “I get inspired by what’s around me.” “Ok, that makes sense now.”This is an original work. It may not be reproduced or copied without the authors' permission and we do not give permission for this to be shared.
Series: Round-Robin Stories by Month [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1952620
Kudos: 1





	1. Rules

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter will host the writing rules that we suffered under. There are six basic rules that we set up for the October challenge.  
> My writing friends aren't on AO3 so a shout out to Calenlas and Laicolasse for writing this with me.

1\. A writer is allowed to black any text she chooses aside from the exceptions stated in Clause 2  
2\. A writer is not allowed to black character names or physical descriptions  
a. Amendment: a writer may not block significant world-building details such as but not limited to “The nearest body of water is 50 miles away”  
3\. The document is shared in order of writing  
4\. When "The End" is written, the round-robin writing has come to an end and all writers will review the story  
a. Amendment: “The End” cannot be written prior to October 31, 2020.  
5\. Order: sinsrfun10 → Calenlas → Laicolasse *When you complete your turn, add a comment addressed to the next person (that is their signal to begin writing)  
a. Amendment: Send a text or verbally tell the next writer when it is her turn  
6\. The first writer to begin writing on a new day must date the document at the location where she begins writing after inserting a page break.

This story will begin posting in November. The very last chapter will be a redacted version where everyone will get to see what we saw when we wrote. Hope you enjoy!


	2. 1 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First day of writing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: “What?!?!” “A hot pink buck knife?” “When did she go gangsta?” “What did you do?!?!” “I had plans but Emilia said no.” “I had plans but then her plot ruined it.” “What did you redact?!?!” “I had something happen.” “You write strange last names.” “I get inspired by what’s around me.” “Ok, that makes sense now.” “That’s what you left me with?” “Why are you laughing so evilly?” “I haven’t even started redacting yet.” “I fixed it for you.” “Fixed? I wouldn’t call that fixed.”

1 October 2020

A finger gently caressed the area around a Do Not Touch sign. The big red button was calling to be pushed by his hand. His friend walked next to him and grabbed his wrist. 

"It says Do Not Touch, Gregory. I think you would read and obey the signs in my lab," Emilia said, glaring at his audacity.

"Emilia, basic psychology wants me to push the shiny red button. Why don't you want me to push it?"

Emilia shuddered in horror. "Bad things, Greg. Bad things happen when that button is pushed." She paused. "Do you remember when I got this lab? How I got this lab?"

Gregory fought to remember back four years and shrugged. "Nope."

"Woe betide to you then."

Gregory shrugged and pushed the button, waiting, expecting, anticipating…

And then…

Nothing.

Nada, zip, zilch. Not a darn thing happened.

“Emilia! Why did you lie to me?”

Emilia looked at him sidelong. “I didn’t.”

Gregory was about to rebut with “You so did!” when the room began shaking and sirens blared over the speakers.

“Um, Emilia?” Gregory swallowed hard “We’re not going to die, right?”

“Probably not.”

Gregory deadpanned. “Probably?!”

“Well, let’s make it more of a certainty, yeah?” Emilia asked as she ran out of the lab, making sure to grab his arm as she went.

Gregory put up a mild resistance to Emilia’s arm grab but succumbed to the pressure the alarms put on them. 

They safely made it out of the lab and were almost out of the building when Emilia heard it-someone yelling the word professor.

‘Oh no,’ she thought. ‘Why does this student always bug me?’ 

Emilia tightened her grip on Gregory and ran faster, desperate to remove herself from the lab sirens and her student. The sound of the yelling only moved closer. Emilia couldn’t keep up her pace and slowed down. The student, unfortunately, caught up.

“Professor Dlaun! Professor Dlaun! Thank goodness I caught you! The lab! The alarms were going off!” She spouted as she ran to Emilia and Gregory.

Emilia took deep breaths, not because she was winded but because this student somehow always triggered a migraine.

“Samantha. Samantha! Breathe!” Emilia directed at her exasperating student. “I know the alarms were going off. That is why Professor Xoi and I were running away.”

Samantha deflated into her loosely worn zip-up hoodie. “Oh. Sorry Professors,” she muttered, turning away. 

“Samantha, thank you for letting me know,” Emilia grimaced and Gregory elbowed her at her grimace. “I appreciate your initiative about the alarm.”

Samantha perked up at her favorite professor’s statement of appreciation. “Thanks, Professor! I need to go work on the report that’s due in class tomorrow!” Samantha turned and called over her shoulder, “See you later!”

Gregory looked at his colleague in disbelief. “That is the student you complain about migraines from? She is the best student in the labs by far.” His eyes asked Emilia the question he couldn’t voice aloud, ‘Why do you hate her?’

Emilia grimaced again, “I don’t hate her. I … I just-just-she rubs me the wrong way, ok?!”

“Ok, fine. Touchy subject. I’ll back down.”

Emilia glared at Greg. As if that was the biggest problem here.

Just as she was thinking this, there came the sound of an explosion followed swiftly by a bright light which engulfed Emilia, Greg, and the ever-so-slightly-less-than-frantic Samantha. An electric pulse ran through Emilia, and she heard screaming around her, realizing after a moment that it was her voice. Greg and Samantha seemed to have disappeared, swallowed up in the chaotic pulses of energy around her.

And then everything went dark.

The next thing Emilia was aware of was a ringing in her ears. Then her eyes hurt as if there was a bright light accosting them. She raised an arm to block the light as she slowly opened her eyes and found herself in a dilapidated cabin.

“You’re awake!”

Emilia groaned. She wasn’t sure what the first thing she wanted to see in this situation was, but it definitely wasn’t her excitable student.

“Samantha,” She ground out, trying to sit up but being greeted by a sharp pain in her abdomen. “Where are we?”

“Some cabin - Professor Xoi went to get water from the stream we passed. You shouldn’t try to sit up. Oh, and when did you get a tattoo?”

“I don’t have a tattoo.” So, on the list of strange things since the explosion:

1\. Injury to the abdomen - unconfirmed but likely  
2\. Mysterious tattoo - confirmed but unspecified  
3\. Dilapidated cabin - it looked to be pretty well built at least  
4\. Stream - the closest body of water to the lab should’ve been the ocean… 5 miles away  
5\. Greg doing manual labor - probably due to Samantha’s nagging?  
6\. Samantha - Well, she was always strange…

It took some convincing, but eventually Samantha agreed to give Emilia some privacy. Of course that didn’t mean she was quiet… oh, no, Samantha stood on the outside of the cabin door animatedly talking about… well she was talking excitedly about something, but between the closed door, rushed speed of elocution, and general Samanthaness of the discourse, Emilia wasn’t really sure. She did hear something about a “pink elephant” and “kamikaze squirrels.”

With Samantha out of the room, Emilia slowly moved around to check the status of her abdomen and see about locating the mysterious tattoo. Against Samantha’s specific instructions to NOT sit up, Emilia chose to very, very, veeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrry slowly sit up and unwrap the-

“AAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!” 

Or not. 

“What’s wrong?!” Greg and Samantha burst through the doors, Greg carrying a bucket with water sloshing out everywhere and Samantha holding a buck knife - with a hot pink handle - with a “where’s the bad guy?” look on her face. 

Samantha slowly lowered her hot pink buck knife and glared at Emilia. “I told you not to sit up. Abdomen injuries are the worst on healing,” she paused. “I would know, I got shot by my sister because she couldn’t shoot to save her life.” There was an awkward and horrified silence that Samantha broke with muttering, “I would not have her with me during a zombie apocalypse,” and “At least it wasn’t buckshot.”

Gregory gaped at the two women in the sparse room. He did not drop the bucket of water on the floor, but his grip on the bucket seemed to be waning. 

Emilia was in pain and made sure to keep herself prone. Emilia did not like pain and cursed her period when it came every month. Emilia kept breathing deep and barely registered what Samantha was saying about how she got her abdomen scarring. The scarred hole in Samantha’s side, because, of course, Samantha was showing off her sister-inflicted bullet wound, looked kinda nice. It didn’t heal horribly as Emilia had seen in pictures of other bullet wounds. Emilia really wished that Samantha wasn’t going into detail about the kind of round that went into Samantha’s side years ago, but Gregory kept asking her questions and Samantha kept supplying them. 

Emilia broke Gregory and Samantha’s intense conversation about scars up when she said, “Are there any pain killers here?” Emilia whined, “It hurts.” 

Samantha and Gregory looked at each other and then at Emilia. They both had the ‘Bad News Look’ on their faces. 

Emilia sighed exasperatedly, “Of course not. I am stuck in this hell hole with NO PAIN MEDS WHILST IN PAIN!” 

Gregory leaned over to Samantha and whispered, “Emilia does not like being in pain at all.” 

“I couldn’t tell,” Samantha sarcastically whispered back.


	3. 2 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Second day of writing: things happened....

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: “You write strange last names.” “I get inspired by what’s around me.” “Ok, that makes sense now.” “That’s what you left me with?” “Why are you laughing so evilly?” “I haven’t even started redacting yet.” “I fixed it for you.” “Fixed? I wouldn’t call that fixed.” "Another list!" "Now you have to make a list."

2 October 2020

“We need to wash the wound” Gregory spoke louder.

“Oh, no!” Emilia nearly shouted, then winced as she did so. “No, you are not!”

Gregory and Samantha shared a look and then Samantha pinned Emilia down as Gregory nearly dumped the entire bucket of water on the wound.

Emilia screamed, pain flashed through her eye - and then… the pain was gone. Replaced by a calming quiet.

“Uh, Emilia.” Greg began.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “What?” She hissed, do you want to throw salt at me next?”

“No, uh -”

“Your eyes are glowin’” Samantha cut in. “An eerie goldy-yellowy color, and that blood-red tattoo o’ yours is glowing too.”

“I told you, I don’t have a tattoo.” Emilia shot back as the calming quiet washed over her again, and a pulsing began in her temple.

At first, the pulsing was pleasant… almost like a mother’s heartbeat calming an infant, but as it became stronger, pain pushed its way in as well. A scream - no. Three screams - pierced the air, and it took Emilia a moment to realize the screams belonged to her, Greg, and Samantha.

The room had become unbearably hot, and inky black tendrils with eerie red veins writhing around them spread out from Emilia - so far as she could tell from her forehead where the heat seemed focused to an almost scalding degree.

Wind began to whip the black and red tendrils about the room with incredible force, and Emilia could swear she saw a flash of silver and pink flash past her head. Nothing made sense. Nothing…

Emilia woke up when the sun was high in the sky. How did she know the sun was high in the sky? It blinded her upon waking. She sat up, surprisingly easily, and looked around. 

The trees seemed far away, but river or creek….Emilia’s head began to ache. The moving body of water was closer to Emilia’s position.

‘Wait, I was-I was with someone. No someones! Who was I with? Why am I here? Where is here? Why does my head-’ Emilia rubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands. 

A noise caught Emilia’s attention away from the moving body of water. It sounded like a tree branch falling. She saw a person holding a hot pink buck knife stumble into the clearing. 

“Professor Dlaun! Thank goodness I found you! Have you seen Professor Xoi? He wasn’t near where I woke up,” the woman with the hot pink knife said as she moved closer to Emilia.

Emilia startled and asked, “Who are you, and why does my head hurt?”

The woman balked and the blood drained from her face. “Professor, my name is Samantha LaLri and I am one of your graduate students in your Applied Physics class. I’m here to help you.” The woman-Samantha- slowly moved closer to Emilia and quietly said, “There was an accident in the lab last night, and the three of us, you, Professor Xoi, and I were moved somewhere else. We never figured out where. And then we got separated in another move. What do you remember about last night in the cabin?”

Emilia groaned. “I don’t know, my head is pounding and trying to remember hurts,” she whined, calmed by Samantha’s tender tone. 

For a moment, Emilia could have sworn there was a look of - pity? Derision? - something on Samantha’s face. But it disappeared just as quickly, and the woman - her student apparently - began telling her about some button that shouldn’t have been pushed, a lab, and Professor Gregory Xoi.

Emilia couldn’t remember anything. If she tried, a dull aching began in her temple and something in the back of her mind told her not to let it grow, so she stopped trying to remember and settled with whatever this Samantha, student, person told her. The name “Gregory” evoked something - feelings of some kind but she wasn’t sure of what.

And _that_ made her worried.

Emilia began to realize she was having trouble understanding any emotions - even her own. She felt this was

_Wrong._

She felt wrong.

The girl - Samantha - seemed to get more agitated as time passed. Emilia didn’t understand why, but she felt increasingly worried the lower the sun sank as well. She was pretty sure it had nothing to do with being outside. Although something niggling in the back of her mind told her that probably wasn’t good either.

Samantha had tried to get Emilia to get up so they could search for shelter, but after a throbbing exploded at her temple and the world started fading to black, Emilia refused. The ground was fine. It was cold, hard, dirty, unforgiving, but fine.

Emilia didn’t even change her mind when the bugs started to come. They seemed to leave her alone, focusing on Samantha instead, and even though Samantha’s incessant complaints were irritating, Emilia couldn’t find it in herself to care, especially when considering the alternative.

Emilia started trying to make a mental checklist of what was going on:

1\. Memory - faulty, missing pieces, but able to form new  
2\. Sitting up - fine and easy. So why is it surprising?  
3\. Standing up - BAD!! Pain and blackness  
4\. Injuries - no physical signs other than temple throbbing and world fading on standing  
5\. Trees - far away  
6\. Water - close  
7\. Shelter - none  
8\. Gregory - source of unknown emotions  
9\. Emotions - not making sense  
10\. Bugs - won’t approach me, but will attack Samantha  
11\. Form of defense - one hot pink buck knife  
12\. Samantha - well, yeah.

Splashing sounds broke through Emilia’s reverie in the twilight. Samantha asked, “What is that?” 

They both turned to gaze at the water coming through the tree line. Emilia winced a little when she contorted to look behind. A pink and silver glow emanated from the tree line. It hurt Emilia’s eyes to look at it. Emilia glanced at Samantha and the look on Samantha’s face made Emilia feel scared too. 

The splashing got louder as whatever was splashing moved closer to the clearing that the women were in. In the twilight glow and an unnatural glow of the pink and silver, a large shape began to form in the distance. Samantha began to pray, prayers lowly stumbling from her lips. 

The shape came a few feet from the tree line as though it could see the two women on the other bank near the middle of the clearing. Samantha quickly stood up, her prayers silent now, and squinted to see exactly what the shape was. 

“Professor Xoi?” She called hopefully and excitedly.

“No professor here,” the shape growled, echoing through the clearing.

Samantha already had her hot pink buck knife in hand, her knuckles turning white around the handle. 

Samantha called with a strength that Emilia knew had to be faked, “Who are you and what do you want?”

“I want my clearing free of parasites like you,” the shape grumbled out, seemingly annoyed by Samantha’s questions. Emilia somehow sympathized with the shape’s exasperation with Samantha asking questions.

The throbbing came back, and Emilia began to lose focus. She thought for a moment she heard Samantha talking to her, but the words faded away before reaching her ears.

“Well, well.” The shape spoke. “Interesting.” And then it lunged toward Emilia.

Though it was all a blur, Emilia thought she spotted Samantha jabbing her hot pink buck knife into the creature - person - thing before being thrown back into a tree. There was a loud cracking sound, and then Samantha crumpled to the forest floor.

And that was the last thing Emilia remembered.

“-lia” A voice greeted her ears “Emilia!” Something, no, someone shook her shoulders. She sat up groggily.

“What happened?”

“I was going to ask you that.” A man’s face came into view. It felt _familiar_ , and that _emotion_ was back.

“Gregory?” She asked.

“Since when do you use my full name?” The man shook his head, placing a hand on her forehead.

Emilia withdrew cautiously. “I - what are you doing?”

“Checking for a fever.” Gregory sighed. “Seriously though, what happened? There are monster bits - at least I _assume_ that’s what that goop is” - he signalled to a mound of fleshy bits scattered about the ground - “Samantha is unconscious and it looks like she has a few broken bones, and you - you look perfectly fine on the ground in the center of it all - you know aside from the bloody-looking tattoo that’s not a tattoo on your forehead.”

“Uh” Emilia didn’t want to think about what the fleshy mound probably was or how it became like that. For once, blacking out and not remembering seemed like a good thing.

“So, no explanation then?” Gregory asked.

“I don’t have a tattoo.” Emilia muttered, the words falling naturally from her lips despite her unsurety at the statement. Why did she feel so adamant about that?

Gregory chuckled lightly. Emilia felt goosebumps.

“Anyway, we should find some shelter. It looks like storm clouds are gathering. They’re blocking out the stars.” Emilia looked up at Gregory’s comment. Sure enough, the sky was darkening, little twinkling lights getting blotted out and the moon’s light becoming dimmer by the second, blessedly making it difficult to see the fleshy mound.

“You have to carry me.” Gregory panicked at Emilia’s statement.

“What?! Why?! You’re not hurt, right?” He started checking her for wounds, not finding any. 

“When I stand up, my head throbs and I black out.” Emilia was going to continue her explanation, but a groan drew her attention.

“Oh good, you’re back, Professor Xoi.” Samantha’s voice sounded strained.

“Yes,” Gregory replied, distracted by Emilia’s perplexing condition.

“I’m not standing up just yet, go check on her,” Emilia ordered Gregory.

Gregory sighed and did as his long-time friend and colleague bade him. He slowly moved over to Samantha, avoiding any stray monster bits in his way. He knelt down next to Samantha and began asking her a series of questions about her pain level.

“Overall pain level?”

“Nine?”

Pain level here?” as he manipulates the unbroken looking arm.

“OW!” Samantha yelled, pulling away from his light grip.

“Was that a ten?” He calmly and soothingly asked.

She sobbed her agreement.

“Samantha, I’m going to be realistic. We need to move and I have to help both of you to do so. I can only carry one of you at a time.” He paused, took an uncomfortable and anxious gulp of air and continued. “And you probably shouldn’t be moved due to your ribs. I’m afraid moving you will kill you. But I’m also afraid that not moving you will kill you too.” Gregory looked directly into Samantha’s pain-glazed eyes and asked, “What do you want to do?”

When she heard Gregory’s words, something gripped Emilia’s heart. Probably another one of those confounded emotions that she couldn’t understand. But whatever it was, it made her forehead throb, and before she knew what was going on an inky tendril swept from her toward Samantha and plunged into the young woman’s chest.

Samantha screamed.

“What are you doing?” Gregory nearly shouted, grabbing the hot pink buck knife from the ground beside Samantha. But before he could use it, Samantha grabbed his wrist.

“Don’t. It - it hurts less now.”

Gregory’s eyes went wide.

The tendril withdrew and Samantha sat up shakily as Gregory handed back her knife.

“Just what is going on here?” Gregory intoned.

“Dunno.” Samantha shrugged. “But I feel WAY better now.” She stood up. “How about you Emilia?”

Samantha and Gregory turned to her, but Emilia found she couldn’t respond. She was too tired. When the tendril had entered Samantha’s chest it had felt like something left her own body - energy maybe? Well, whatever it was, it left her drained, tired. She just wanted to sleep for a bit.

“Emilia!” Gregory’s panicked voice was the last thing she heard before she blacked out again.

She really needed to stop doing that.

An irritating buzzing noise was coming from somewhere, but Emilia was content to keep her eyes shut for now. The buzzing could wait. She was tired.

“lia. —ake— ease! —lia!” Whoever was talking was annoying her. She wanted to sleep. But he seemed panicked. 

“— on. Y— ve — Emilia!” Oh, was he talking to her? Fine, she would try opening her eyes. But just a little.

As she cracked her eyes open, Gregory’s worried face came into view. She also started to feel something… a warmth. Her hand was warm and it felt like something was surrounding it… something warm and soft. A hand, maybe?

“Thank goodness!” Gregory seemed to have noticed her opening her eyes, and the worry lines eased a bit. “You’ve been out for three days! Samantha said you just needed time to heal, but I was so worried that you might- that you wouldn’t- well you did, so it doesn’t matter now. How are you feeling?”

Emilia took her time answering the question. “I think I’m feeling better,” she answered shakily. “Where are we?”

Samantha’s voice came from a newly opened doorway. “I think we might be in Africa.”

“Africa?” Emilia asked incredulously. “Weren’t we in North America before? More specifically weren’t we in the United States before? How did we get here?” Emilia hissed at her two companions.

“Um, yeah. About that…” Gregory trailed off. “We have no idea.” 

Samantha picked up where Gregory left off. “After you blacked out, we began to walk. To get away from the clearing and the… bits left behind.” Samantha took a deep breath to continue, “We walked along the river for a day but after our last rest we woke up a few hours walk from this building.”

“We were lucky to find it,” Gregory chimed in. 

Emilia put some blanks together. “Do you mean that we were somehow _transported_ in our _sleep_ to _Africa_?” 

“Uh, yeah.” “Yep.” were the simultaneous replies of her well-meaning caretakers.

About that time, Emilia realized there was a chain attached to her ankle… and one attached to Gregory and one attached to Samantha.

Time for a mental checklist of strangeness.

1\. Africa - she was unclear _why_ she knew this should be the United States, but…  
2\. Transportation or Teleportation - yeah, that shouldn’t be real… right?  
3\. Chains - are we being held captive, arrested, or...?  
4\. The pile of fleshy bits - she still didn’t want to think about what _that_ was  
5\. Samantha - she seemed healthy… why was that odd?

The worst part of this situation was that it somehow felt normal for everything to be so screwed up that nothing made sense.

Somehow the ankle chains on Samantha and Gregory were long enough to reach the doorway. Emilia’s ankle chain was short and confined her to the bed she was sitting on and the nearby curtained-off toilet. 

“How long have we been _here_? In this building? Chained by an ankle?” Emilia asked.

Samantha came closer to Emilia’s bed. “About two days for the building-”

Gregory interrupted Samantha, “But almost 12 hours for being chained.” Gregory said, glaring at Samantha. “ _She_ threatened the owner of the building.” 

“What?! Why did you do that, Samantha?”

Samantha looked affronted. “That-that _man_ offered to pay for my time in _his bed_!” Samantha’s voice became shrill on the last two words of her yell.

Both of the professors looked sheepish and Gregory apologized for blaming her for being chained. It was Samantha’s fault, but Gregory knew that Samantha was not known for tact and the owner basically called her a whore. 

“So, what now?” Emilia asked, tugging mindlessly on the chains.

_Wait_.

“Well, now we wait for the owner to come back so I can kick him in the -”

“Uh, guys,” Emilia cut Samantha off, “my chains are loose.”

“What?” Gregory asked, coming close to Emilia to look at the chains.

An emotion of some kind that Emilia still could not identify welled up in her the moment Gregory came close to her, and she backed away, hitting the wall… 

And leaving a dent in the stone…


	4. 3 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day three of writing: Emilia got more powers....

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "I love that Samantha is always last on the list." "Why do I have to sort THIS out?"

3 October 2020

“Follow my finger.” Gregory was doing his best to run a complete diagnosis for a concussion. Emilia understood why. She had blacked out after banging her head on the wall hard enough to dent it after all. Apparently super strength does not always come with super durability.

“What is going on with me?” Emilia asked, a different unidentifiable emotion making her chest tighten and breaths increase and become erratic. Emilia thought through a list of strange things happening to her:

1\. Super strength  
2\. Not knowing what she is feeling  
3\. Losing time  
4\. Somehow on a different continent  
5\. Not chained but was in chains…  
6\. Who are these people that she is chained with?  
7\. She has a tattoo?  
8\. Healing powers?  
9\. Samantha - somehow she was also on this list

“Well, you seem to be okay.” Gregory said, though he sounded a bit unsure of himself.

“Then why don’t you try yanking again?” Samantha spoke up. “Once you yank your chains out, you can yank out mine and I’ll go get my precious hot pink buck knife back and then slit the owner’s throat and-”

“No one is slitting anybody’s throat.” Gregory stated. “But yeah, yanking the chains out would be good. And then we can sneak out of here.”

“And get my buck knife.” Samantha added.

Gregory groaned.

Emilia stifled a laugh - she wasn’t sure _why_ she laughed, but she did. Gregory glanced at her, and she thought for a moment she saw a smile on his face, but then it was gone and he was looking serious again.

“Can you do it?”

“I’ll try.” Emilia replied, pulling on the chain around her ankle. 

It came out of the wall. She was free, but the chain dragged along the ground and made a clanking sound. That was going to be a problem. And her chain was shorter than Gregory and Samantha’s.

Thinking for a moment, she grabbed Gregory’s chain with her hands a little spread and pulled her hands away from each other. Sure enough the chain snapped.

“Good thinking.” Samantha spoke up. “But if you’re gonna do that why not yank it apart at the ankle so there isn’t anything extra?”

Emilia nodded and grabbed the chain on her own ankle with one hand and used her other hand to grab about one chain link away. Then she pulled and the chain snapped off at her ankle. She repeated this for Gregory - who flinched a little when she grabbed the chain on his ankle - and then for Samantha.

Okay, now they just had to find a way to sneak out without anyone seeing them.

“So, do we know if we are being guarded or what the security is like?” Emilia asked.

“Well, there were a couple scary looking guys at the entrance to the building…” Samantha noted. “Aside from that there is the owner who took my hot pink buck knife and-”

“Why are you so obsessed with the buck knife?” Gregory asked.

“Obviously because we need it. And because” Samantha trailed off, not finishing her thought and instead staring intensely at Emilia. “Uh, your tattoo is glowing again.”

“I don’t have a tattoo!”

“Then what is that ink glowing on your forehead?” Samantha asked, pointing at Emilia’s head.

Before Emilia could respond, an inky black tendril shot out of her forehead toward the door, followed quickly by a second one. And then they split and crashed through the stone wall on either side of the door.

There were a couple of screams, and then everything went black.

“It wouldn’t be hard.”

“No.”

“But-“

“NO.”

“Fine.”

Emilia wasn’t sure what they were arguing about, but she was glad Gregory shut down Samantha’s whining. The sound was grating to the nerves.

“So what happened after I blacked out this time?” Emilia grumbled.

“Ah, you’re awake.” Gregory was immediately in front of Emilia shining a penlight in her eyes. Emilia flinched away instinctively. “Sorry. I know it’s bright, but I need to make sure your pupils are reacting properly. Falling unconscious after a possible concussion isn’t exactly a good thing.” 

Apparently satisfied that he’d learned all he could with the light, Gregory proceeded to run through other simple cognitive tests that could be done in the field without supplies or equipment.

“You’ve only been out a half a day this time.” Samantha piped up as Gregory continued his examination. “We got my hot pink buck knife back and left the building behind. We entered a nearby forest, found a stream, walked in it for a bit to hide our tracks, found a cave, and set up a temporary camp.”

As Samantha gave her summary of recent events, Emilia took in her surroundings. The lighting was dim, but it was enough to make out rocky walls. This was probably the cave Samantha mentioned. It smelled musty. 

A small pile of wood rested against one of the walls, close to a fire that was creating the light. It seemed they were far enough inside the cave that they couldn’t see the light from the entrance.

“Wait, what’s that?” Emilia indicated a large canvas bag off to one side.

“Oh that’s some provisions we managed to steal on our way out.” Samantha smiled proudly.

“There’s a few clothes that will hopefully fit, some food that isn’t likely to spoil, a flint fire starter that made setting up camp a lot easier, and a few other things.” Gregory explained.

So they still only had a vague idea of where they were (Africa was, after all, a pretty big place), but this time they had more supplies than just what was in their pockets. That was progress. Kind of.

It was a good thing that the group could handle a little bit of smoke because it was getting colder as the night went on. The cave had poor ventilation and the smoke wafted through the air, dimming the light in the cave even more.

Still, it was better than being chained to a stone wall, better than lying in a clearing surrounded by fleshy bits, and (barely) better than that log cabin that had no resources other than a pail - at least none that Emilia was aware of. Oh, and despite the smoke, her temple wasn’t throbbing.

_That_ was definitely a good sign.


	5. 4 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day four of writing: Emilia most definitely does NOT have a tattoo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "If you don't know what to do, try adding a dream sequence." "So did you write a lot or did you decide to let her deal with the problem? Or somewhere in between?" "I passed the problem along." "Plot* not problem." "I swear it's not a problem." "I did the same." "Oh, yeah... I totally helped with the plot... shifty eyes" "...I wrote a whole page and got 4 lines from it. Between the TWO of you." "I am exacting vengeance now" "Laicolasse.... Laicolasse... I think we messed up" "Major plot developments caused by a writer creating suspense over a possibly trivial detail" "Hey, I didn't leave a problem this time! I created a nice atmosphere." "I'm handing it back to her before midnight"

4 October 2020

_The inky blackness was suffocating. It closed in, made her feel small, helpless. Everything hurt, but nothing hurt. She felt numb. Then there were people. Important people. People she knew, for some reason she couldn’t, no didn’t want to forget. She saw them in the corner of her eye. Just for a moment. Then they were gone. ‘No! Come back!’ her voice didn’t come out. Instead it was swallowed by the blackness. Cold. She was very cold._

“Em- ts -kay.” A man’s voice. _The blackness receded, faded as warmth spread from her shoulder. It warmed her, calmed her._

When Emilia woke up, she couldn’t quite remember what she had dreamed about. She had a strange feeling that she’d heard Gregory talking to her.

Emilia was taking stock of how her body felt with her eyes closed. “Emilia, wake up.” She heard as her body was shaken.

“I was already awake. Stop touching me,” Emilia growled, eyes still closed. 

She heard a sigh, and then Gregory’s voice. “That’s good then.” He stopped shaking her, but he kept one hand on her shoulder.

Emilia opened her eyes to look at him. She was about to tell him to stop touching her again, but the look on his face made her stop. In the flickering light of a dying fire, she could see worry, anxiety, and something else - something that made her heart beat, though she couldn’t name it.

“You seemed to be having a nightmare.” Gregory spoke softly. “And then that tattoo on your forehead-”

“I don’t have a tattoo.” Emilia mumbled.

Gregory just looked at her in silence for a moment, his grip tightening briefly on her shoulder. “Anyway, when I started talking to you and shook you a bit, the mark stopped glowing.” He leaned against the wall of the cave by her head. “Every time that mark glows, something _unnatural_ happens, and then you pass out.”

Emilia nodded, not knowing what to say.

“Do you know how scared I was?”

Emilia was quiet. What could she say to that? She glanced around the cave while she was searching for the words to answer and spotted Samantha out cold on the other side of the fire. Their few provisions were stashed along the far wall of the cave. Something, some _emotion_ gripped her heart, and she finally found the words she wanted to say.

“I’m sorry.”

“What?” Gregory asked.

Emilia turned to look at him. “I’m sorry that I scared you, that you and Samantha are caught up in whatever this is,” she signalled to her forehead, “that you have to stay in this cave - if it weren’t for me-”

“No, stop.” Gregory held up a hand. “That’s not what I meant. And if anyone should be apologizing, it’s me. You told me not to push the button.” 

He sighed, and Emilia tried for a brief moment to recall what he was talking about, but the thrumming started in her head and she stopped before it could get worse.

“Em,” Gregory began again, “I just wanted to fix things. I _know_ how you got that lab. I thought maybe we could fix it if-” He stopped.

Emilia stared at him, not sure what to say. For one, she didn’t understand half of the words that just came out of his mouth. For another, the moment he called her “Em,” she felt something in her chest, the same _emotion_ she’d been feeling around Gregory for sometime now, but-

_Stronger_.

“Anyway, here.” Gregory handed her some bread and dried meat. “You should eat. You’ve missed way too many meals.”

Emilia grabbed the food and began to eat quickly.

“Slow down, Em.” Gregory pleaded, his hands gently pushing down on her wrists. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

Emilia stopped mid-chew and had a thoughtful look on her face. She began to eat more slowly.

While she was eating, she heard the sound of shuffling from across the campfire.

“Ah, ya two’re up.” A groggy Samantha greeted. “Good fer ya.”

“I’ve been wondering for a while now.” Gregory spoke, stoking the fire while he did so. “What’s with that dialect of yours that only shows up when you’re half asleep or freaking out?”

“Eh?” Samantha blearily rubbed her eyes. “That’s ‘cause _he_ said not ta speak that way ‘round people ya wanna impress… or somethin’ like that.” 

“He?” Emilia asked.

Samantha nodded, still half asleep. “Yeah - _him_. The guy who gave me this.” She held up the hot pink buck knife. Then her eyes went wide and she put a hand over her mouth.

“Awake now?” Gregory asked.

Samantha nodded, her hand still over her mouth.

Emilia wasn’t sure if she wanted to teasingly prod Samantha with a “oh, _him_ ,” patiently wait for Samantha to share if and when she was ready, demand an answer, or simply ignore it and pretend that nothing had happened.

“Breakfast?” Gregory seemed to be choosing the ‘pretend nothing happened’ approach.

“Mef.” Samantha nodded, still covering her mouth. Emilia guessed “mef” probably meant “yes.” 

It was amusing to watch Samantha trying to eat her breakfast without removing her hand from her mouth. At first, Emilia thought she was doing it because she didn’t trust her half-awake brain to keep her mouth shut, and maybe that was the reason initially, but the longer it lasted, the more Emilia became certain that the reason Samantha persisted was pure Samanthaness - a dash of stubbornness, a squeeze of curiosity, a pinch of frustration, and a screw loose.

At any rate, after breakfast, the group sat down… well stayed seated really, and attempted to develop a plan. First, Emilia summarized what they knew:

“1. The Not Tattoo - it occasionally glows, supernatural things happen, and I pass out  
2\. Location - a cave in a forest near a stream somewhere in Africa not far from a building  
3\. Enemies - the owner of the building, his subordinates, and probably who- or whatever brought us to Africa  
4\. Help - probably doesn’t even know we need it  
5\. Supplies - enough provisions to last about a week, maybe two if we stretch them, a fire started (flint), a change of clothes, a hot pink buck knife, a few miscellaneous items  
6\. Health - aside from memory loss and occasional throbbing in the temple that seems to be caused by or at least related to the not tattoo, I appear to be healthy. Samantha is healthy. Gregory is healthy.   
7\. Samantha - still Samantha”

“Wait, why am I the last thing on the list?”

“You’re always the last point on the list.”

“Oh.”


	6. 5 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day five of writing: Backstory! Kinda..

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made no comments on day five...

5 October 2020

_Four years ago….or how Emilia got her lab:_

_Emilia heard that the waitlist for getting her own lab was … long. She sighed but kept planning the experiments she wanted to run, one day, in the future._

_Her best friend Greg and his girlfriend, Samantha Nun, joined Emilia’s booth at the diner near the college. Samantha was always envious of the deep friendship that Greg and Emilia had and flat out told Greg that he was not allowed to meet with Emilia without her. The longtime friends just looked at each other, shrugged, and put up with her jealousy._

_“Hey Em, did you hear?” Greg asked, settling himself in the pink-colored booth._

_“No, what?” She asked, distracted with a new experiment._

_“A lab opened up in the Physics labs!”_

_Emilia dropped her pencil in shock. “Wh-wha? How? Why?” She peppered him with questions. She leaned over the table close to Greg and hissed, “Whose lab?”_

_Greg gulped but calmly answered the questions. “I don’t know what or how. The why and the lab answer the same question. Dr. Lenox was running an experiment. I heard someone needed to push a button on the control board. Dr. Lenox is hospitalized with four lab assistants. Lab gossip is that he refuses to step into that lab ever again.”_

_“Who’s Dr. Lenox? Why is getting a free lab so important?” Samantha asked, cutting into the conversation._

_Greg took his girlfriend’s hand and looked into her eyes. “A lab is important because then scientists can run experiments to prove any hypotheses they have. Labs are assigned to particular teams. Dr. Lenox has been in his lab for six years-the longest time someone has been in that lab ever. Everyone else has been in the labs for less than two years. The waiting list is always full and Em has been waiting for a lab for three years?” He glanced at Emilia at the end of the questions._

_Emilia nodded and gestured for him to continue his explanation. The less she spoke to Samantha the better._

_“Basically, Em now can get her own lab since she is on the top of the waiting list and conduct the experiments she has been wanting to conduct for at least a decade. She also wants to fully prove several hypotheses she has.”_

_“Oh, I get it.” Samantha paused, “But why don’t you want your own lab?”_

_Greg laughed. “I’m a biologist. I don’t need a whole lab to myself. I’m not a greedy physicist,” he replied, looking at Emilia with laughter in his eyes._

_“At least I don’t have to deal with contaminants accidentally following me home!” Emilia exclaimed, continuing the longtime argument._

_“Ew! Do you really bring things home Greggy?” Samantha asked, horror dripping from every syllable._

_“No, Samantha. Em’s just making a joke.”_

_“Yeah, just joking here. Greggy-” Emilia gagged on the nickname. “doesn’t bring anything on his clothes. There is a lot of safety in the labs. I wonder how the accident happened in Lenox’s lab.”_

End Flashback

Gregory woke with a start. He wasn’t sure when he fell asleep, but he did _not_ enjoy dreaming about his ex - and he was _really_ glad Em never called him ‘Greggy.’ Looking back, he wasn’t sure how he put up with that nickname for so long…

At any rate, the nightmare of a dream _did_ at least have some important information in it - not that he _needed_ to dream about it to remember.

_I guess now we know why no one stayed in the lab for long…_

But more importantly, Dr. Lenox and his lab assistants had supposedly spent an inordinately long time in the lab without contacting anyone just before being hospitalized - so long in fact that one of the lab assistants who was a student still living with his parents had been reported missing. If the current situation was any indication, then maybe... 

Well, then again, there _was_ the whole ‘all of them were hospitalized’ bit which wasn’t so good...

_But_ on the other hand, they did make it back.

“Emilia,” Gregory turned to the woman he loved, careful not to use his nickname for her now that Samantha was up - they had agreed a long time ago not to use pet names in front of students (though Em often called him ‘Greg’ anyway, claiming it was such a common name that no one would notice). 

He hesitated before continuing. Em had lost her memories, and it seemed she didn’t want to remember for some reason, so he wasn’t sure he should really do this, but he couldn’t remember all the details about Dr. Lenox’s group, and they needed any info they could get.

“What?” Em stared at him. “I assume you had something more to say than my name.”

Gregory sighed. “Yeah, listen, I need you to think… no, I want to know if you remember Dr. Lenox.”

Emilia didn’t respond right away. Instead, Gregory watched as her eyebrows furrowed in thought. 

“I don’t-“ Emilia cut herself short, clutching her head tightly as a pained groan escaped her. The mark (definitely not a tattoo - Em would never willingly get one after seeing what happened to her father) started glowing again.

“Em, can you hear me?” Gregory grabbed hold of her shoulders. He wanted desperately to pull her into a bear hug and make everything okay again. 

Emilia squeezed her eyes shut and started shaking as the glowing intensified.

“Emilia, look at me. Focus on me. It’s going to be okay. You don’t have to remember.” Gregory really wished he remembered the calming techniques his therapist had taught him when he was struggling with panic attacks in high school. Granted this wasn’t the same as a panic attack, but…

“It hurts.” Gregory felt his heart clenching when he heard Emilia’s voice. 

“I know it hurts. I’m sorry.” He held her head in his hands and tried to gently but firmly turn it towards his face. “Look at me Emilia. Focus on me.”

After a few more minutes that felt like years of Emilia mumbling and groaning, tears of pain slipping down her cheeks, her breathing started to even out, and the pained creases smoothed away. The mark also faded back to its dormant state. Emilia slumped forward, leaning against Gregory’s chest as she fell into an exhausted sleep.

“So, I’ll go get some water.” Samantha’s voice startled Gregory. He had nearly forgotten she was there.

“Be careful. Take your buck knife.”

“I wouldn’t go anywhere without it.”

Samantha hummed as she went to get water. She carried a stolen canteen that hopefully would be enough to satisfy the three of them for a while. Because while the water was close, it was still tricky to get to it.

She could hear the water moving and finally made it to a place where she was able to fill the canteen. She drank greedily from the canteen and refilled it to bring back to her professor and her friend. There were rumors on campus that Professors Dlaun and Xoi were a thing and had been for years. They were so close and apparently no outside relationship could withstand the closeness between the professors. There was a huge blowup in the quad a couple of years before Samantha transferred in that resulted in Professor Xoi breaking up with his girlfriend. There were a few jokes about her getting none, but Samantha didn’t understand them. 

Samantha made it back to their base camp and helped Professor Dlaun drink some of the water. Hopefully, that helped with the professor’s headache. Samantha then passed the canteen to Professor Xoi. 

“Are you feeling better, Professor Dlaun?” Samantha asked, looking in the bag for food to pass around. 

“I am. Thank you for getting water, Samantha.” Professor Dlaun responded. 

“Oh, you’re welcome,” Samantha replied, not looking up.

“Did you see anyone while you were out there?” Professor Xoi cut in.

Samantha shook her head. “Nah.” Then she thought better of her speech. “I mean, no. There was no one out there.”

From the corner of her eye, Samantha caught sight of Professor Dlaun stifling a laugh. 

Well, at least she was feeling better. Weird things happened when she wasn’t feeling too good. And besides, she was a good person - even with that weird tattoo-not-a-tattoo thingy on her forehead and the whole “I don’t remember nuthin’” thing.

“So do we have a plan for how to get out of Africa and back to the US?” Samantha thought back to their previous planning session. Emilia listing off things they knew was about all they had managed to accomplish. Really, Samantha felt like she might as well be in a novel with all sorts of plot jumps and missing details that the author just didn’t want to be bothered to explain. 

“I’ve been thinking about that.” Gregory boiled some of the water Samantha had brought and prepared some of the provisions for a meal as he answered. “I think I have an idea.”

“Great! So what’s yer plan?” Samantha was all for having an adventure, but she had finals to study for and experiments to run - oh, and she was worried about Professor Dlaun - so she was more than a little excited.


	7. 6 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An explanation

6 October 2020

No writing was done today because sinsrfun10’s computer glitched and wasn’t done reloading the operating system until roughly 2300 hours. It wasn’t ready for anything with her writing software until 2200 hours on 7 October 2020. It was also sinsrfun10’s turn to write. It was not a fun 48 hours for sinsrfun10.


	8. 7-9 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three days of writing: the seventh, eighth, and ninth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing: "I added a detail." "This is a pretty effective writing style aside from all the plot holes. If you have writers block or don't want to bother figuring it out, just pass it to the next person." "Did we change pov again today?"

7 October 2020

“My plan is to, well,” Professor Xoi started slowly, looking furtively at Professor Dlaun. “It’s to somehow get the tattoo to transport us back.”

“You want to-” 

“THE STUPID TATTOO THAT GOT US STUCK HER IN DA FIRS’ PLACE?! THAT’S YER PLAN?” Samantha blew up at him, her accent thickening as she yelled.

Professor Xoi held up his hands and began to placate the angry armed young woman. “Samantha, the hypothesis that I have is that the tattoo got us here. If the tattoo can transport us here, why can’t it transport us back?”

Samantha listened to the professor and turned to Professor Dlaun. “What do ya think prof?” Samantha’s accent still unconsciously heavy on her tongue.

Professor Dlaun looked like she was in deep thought. “I think-I think his hypothesis is right and wrong.” She looked up at Samantha and Professor Xoi. “I think the tattoo,” she winced, briefly touching her forehead, “transported us here. But it brought us here for a reason. We just have no idea as to the _reason_ why it brought us here.” 

8 October 2020

“You have a point, there, Emilia.” Gregory spoke solemnly. “But, can we risk trying to find out?”

Emilia thought for a moment about how best to respond. On the one hand, Gregory was right: they didn’t have many resources, there were hostile locals, and she was blacking out every other second. On the other hand…

“But I can’t control the tattoo.” She grimaced at calling it a tattoo, but that’s what the other two called it so she would just use the same term. “And besides, there’s no guarantee that it will take us back until we do whatever we were sent here to do.”

“That’s true…” Gregory reluctantly agreed. “Agh! Why didn’t I go talk to Dr. Lenox with you that time! Then we might know more about what happened to him and we might have a clue about how to get back now.”

A pang of guilt stabbed at Emilia’s heart. “If I could remember…”

“No. Don’t even go there.” Gregory cut her off. “You’ve tried, and it just made you suffer, so don’t go there.”

“So we ‘ave no plan again?” Samantha did not look happy. And her accent reinforced her unhappiness at the situation.

“Samantha, seriously, what is going on with your accent?” Emilia inquired.

Samantha looked upset, caught off guard by Emilia’s question. 

“I was just curious, you don’t have to answer me,” Emilia continued, noticing Samantha’s reaction. Gregory nodded, backing up Emilia’s statement.

Samantha looked like she calmed down a little at Emilia’s statement and Gregory’s affirmation. “I’ll tell you, but I have to skip over some parts because of...reasons.” Samantha said, forcing her accent under control. 

“It started when I was young. My parents were okay, but my grandfather who lived with us had strict rules on how us young’uns presented ourselves to outside society. I may have an accent when I’m upset or plain mad but I can present myself as an educated woman no different than anyone in higher social status.” Samantha held herself up a little higher as she continued her story.

“Grandfather brought in outside help to train us into society ladies. _That_ man was…” Samantha trailed off. “The best thing I learned from _him_ was how to hide a knife in various outfits and still be able to use it easily.” 

“My great-uncle taught us how to use the knife outdoors and not in self-defense. He helped us learn how to survive in the backwoods. My siblings and I were lucky to have two great men in our lives, Grandfather and Great-Uncle.” Samantha’s gaze went unfocused as she murmured, “I miss them.”

9 October 2020

Emilia’s heart twinged, and - from the look on his face - so did Gregory’s.

“Well, that’s the story.” Samantha plastered on a smile. She looked like her perky self, but Emilia thought that maybe not all that perkiness was real. “So, what’re we gonna do now? Try Professor Xoi’s misbegotten plan or search for nonexistent clues about what we’re doin’ ‘ere in da first place?”

“Well,” Gregory stated calmly, “first, you don’t need to ‘talk like a lady’ to impress us, Samantha. Just be yourself. Second, since we don’t have any clues, maybe we try using the tattoo once and if it fails miserably then we don’t do it again and start trying to figure out why we’re here.”

Emilia nodded. “I agree with both those points.” She paused. “And can we _please_ start calling it a mark instead of a tattoo?”


	9. 10 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day ten of writing: new location?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments while writing: "I wanted to send them somewhere new, so I asked Caslu to describe a random location. He described Russia ;P" "A LIST?! NOT ANOTHER LIST!" "I really like the last two sentences I wrote... I thought it was funny."

10 October 2020

… maybe using the mark wasn’t the best plan.

Since the pattern of how the mark activated seemed to at least in part be related to Emilia’s thoughts like when it activated to protect herself or to help Samantha, the group had decided to have Emilia try thinking really hard about going home. The problem, of course, was that Emilia didn’t remember what home looked like or what home felt like, or where home was besides the United States. After some discussion, they ultimately decided that she should try to instinctively think of home combined with the general descriptions that Gregory and Samantha provided her. Perhaps that had been the problem.

This was definitely NOT home. Emilia didn’t even need to see the looks on Gregory and Samantha’s faces to know.

Emilia hadn’t exactly been expecting to show up in her living room, but she did hope to at least be in the right state. Considering their environment; however, considering their current environment, this was not the beautiful island chain of Hawaii. No, that would have been too easy.

They were now standing in a veeeeeery cold place with lots of snow surrounded by an evergreen forest. The clothes that were perfect for Africa, if a little hot, were now inadequate for the lost trio. They stood in shock for what felt like an eternity but was more like five minutes. 

Emilia saw Samantha move in closer for warmth. 

As Samantha spoke, tremors wreaked havoc on her body. “We need shelter. We need it now.” Samantha’s voice was urgent and forceful.

Emilia saw Gregory look around frantically but it was obvious that he had no idea what to look for here. 

Samantha spoke again, “If we move to the trees and dig into the snow next to one, we can build a little hibernation cave. Luckily the bag made it here so it’s possible for us to build a fire and eat a little bit. That’ll make surviving a tinsy bit easier.”

Emilia and Gregory moved to do as Samantha said. They shivered their way over to the closest tree. Samantha had kept walking past them to a tree that was a little smaller around than the one that Emilia and Gregory picked. 

“Why this one?” Gregory asked. 

“Because this one is less likely to catch on fire and burn us,” was Samantha’s tense reply.

Samantha dropped the bag on the ground and began to rifle through it. “I coulda swore I saw a…” she muttered. “I was right!” She yelled triumphantly, holding a folded thing in the air. “A collapsible shovel. That’ll make digging a shelter and a fire hole easier on us.”

Samantha unfolded the shovel and began a motion to begin digging, but Gregory gently grabbed the shovel and ushered Samantha over to Emilia to share body heat. Gregory began to dig.

While Gregory was digging, Emilia thought up a list of pros and cons about whether or not she should try using the mark again.

1\. Pro: It would get us out of this freezing place...hopefully  
2\. Con: It could take us somewhere worse  
3\. Pro: The more she tried to use it, the better her control would get...probably  
4\. Con: Right now it was really hard to control  
5\. Pro: Gregory seems to be hopeful about it...mostly  
6\. Con: Samantha seems iffy about it

Before she could truly make up her mind, Emilia felt something happening. Black tendrils snaked out from her forehead and plunged into the snow where Gregory was digging. Emilia started to feel both warm and exceedingly tired. Then everything went black… again.

“Em- -ake” someone shook her violently. “Y- -n’t -eep -ow.” Her mind felt sluggish, and she was cold. “EMILIA!” Emilia shot up when Gregory shouted in her ear.

“What was that for?!”

“You can’t sleep right now.” Gregory had an apologetic look on his face. “This hole, cave, thing is a lot better than outside in the snow, but it’s still really cold, and we don’t have enough wood for a fire yet.”

With that remark, Emilia’s mark proceeded to burn on her forehead, sending out new black tendrils towards the nearby trees. Emilia passed out.

Samantha was on her knees leaning over Emilia when Emilia opened her eyes. 

“Professor Xoi, she’s awake!”

It felt warm and Emilia could not see the sky above her. 

“Where are we?”

“The cave the mark helped us dig,” Gregory replied, making his way from the fire that Emilia just noticed. 

“How big is this place?”

“It isn’t as big as the cabin but not as small as the room we were locked in in Africa either,” Samantha replied. “That mark is as handy as Deux Ex Machina in books. Resolves problems but makes twenty more in the process.”

Gregory nodded before adding “Yeah, but I doubt it can give us clothing. While we do have a fire and shelter, we only have a little food and we can’t exactly go foraging or hunting the way we’re dressed right now.”

She was still a little groggy, but listening to Gregory and Samantha gave Emilia the determination to try using the mark again. At this point, they weren’t going to survive if she didn’t, so she might take the risk of causing twenty more problems.

“Can you describe home again?” She asked.

Gregory looked at her worriedly. “Em,” he paused and glanced at Samantha, “er Emilia, you’re not thinking of trying the mark again right now, are you? I mean, yeah, we probably should, but not right after you woke up after the second time you passed out in an hour.”

“I second that.” Samantha cut in. “No sense in usin’ that thing now. Just give it a minute, maybe a few minutes. Catch yer breath, make sure you ain’t gonna pass out before ya manage to make it work, reduce the risk of sending us to the seventh circle o’ Hell.”

Emilia sighed but nodded her assent. “Okay, but not too long.”

Gregory studied Em’s face for a moment. She was clearly frustrated with this situation, and he guessed she felt at least partly responsible for this situation even though it wasn’t her fault at all. If anyone was to blame, it was him. She had told him not to push the button, but he did anyway. If he had just listened, the. None of this would have happened.

Well, there was nothing he could do about that now. The best thing he could do was support Em and try to keep all three of them alive. He understood why she wanted to try using the mark again, but he really didn’t want her to end up killing herself by using it too frequently and draining out all of her energy. 

If he had calculated correctly, the rations they had left should still last a couple days. Samantha seemed to know a bit about survival in the outdoors - though he suspected this situation was a first - so she might know how to make some simple traps that they could use to catch small game, assuming there was small game to catch. They might also be able to forage nuts of some kind.

The real problem was clothing. Even if they doubled up with what they were currently wearing and the spare sets they had managed to steal while they were in Africa, it wouldn't be anywhere near enough to keep them warm in the extreme cold. They might be able to turn the bag into a cloak of some kind… there was a basic sewing kit in it. That would at least help a little bit, but it might not be enough, and it would only help one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How you know English majors are writing a story....they casually make mention of common plot devices as they ruthlessly exploit said plot device.


	10. 11 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day eleven of writing: describing a picture in words...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "I think we need to get our accent straight..." "As for the accent... I just sorta make up adjustments in the words on a whim. It's not exactly an accent so much as me having fun breaking the speech." "I changed the Gregory already." “It occurs to me that there are at least two different styles that have been used to write broken speech when Em is waking up.” "Oh dear God, what did you do?!?" "Well, they're up a creek without a paddle. Or a boat. And the creek is a tinsy bit bigger than a creek." 
> 
> Laicolasse: "Are we writing you into a corner, sinsrfun10?"  
> Sinsrfun10:"A little. I really wanted them to be friends."  
> Laicolasse: "...well I had had Greg say think about 'the woman her loved before.' Referring to em."  
> Sinsrfun10: "It could have been platonic!"  
> Laicolasse: "Well to be honest the main reason I did that is because I have an idea for how they'll get home depends on it."  
> Sinsrfun10: "Laicolasse ruined that for you."  
> Laicolasse: "I didn't feel like continuing an awkward conversation so I interrupted it."  
> Calenlas: "..." *looks sidelong at Laicolasse with annoyance*  
> *sinsrfun10 responds with crying-laughing emoji*

11 October 2020

When Professor Xoi told her his idea to forage for nuts or hunt small game, Samantha almost laughed until she saw the earnest look on his face.

“I don’t mean to burst ya bubble professor, but it's winter. Any small game around will be hibernatin’ and those trees out there,” Samantha emphasized pointing up and around. “Those are not nut-producin’ trees. They produce pine cones which’ll be handy in a pinch, but not nuts. Frankly, I’m more afraid of the hibernatin’ animals to be honest.”

Professor Xoi sighed. “Of course.” He glanced at Professor Dlaun who was currently napping. “Do you. Have any ideas that don't require...that?”

Samantha thought for a moment. “Sorry to say it, but nope. I don’t like usin’ that mark thingy, but we ain’t got what we need ta live more ‘n a day or two ‘ere.”

Professor Xoi sighed again. “Well, to be honest, I was expecting that answer. Still… it’s my fault we’re here, yet she’s the one who…” He clenched his fists, clearly frustrated.

“Ya know,” Samantha said, “I’ve been hearin’ ya say ‘it’s my fault’ for some time now. Think ya might wanna finally clue me in on what dragged me - us - inta this mess? All I know is somethin’ happened in the lab, it has somethin’ ta do wit the geezer who had the lab b’fore Prof Dlaun, and it’s apparently your fault.”

Professor Xoi was silent for a moment. “It’s a bit of a long story.”

For the next hour or so while Professor Dlaun was still sleeping, Professor Xoi told Samantha the most Sci-fi sounding story she had ever heard that she couldn’t do anything but believe after the past several days. The story had some gaps - especially relating to what the Dr. Lenox guy who used to own the lab knew. Apparently, Professor Dlaun had talked to him in the hospital once just before she took over the lab and came away from the meeting saying the old man was delirious.

When Professor Dlaun started moaning and scrunching her face up like she was having a nightmare, Professor Xoi immediately went to her and talked gently to her sleeping form. Samantha heard him call her “Em” again. Samantha would have taken the opportunity to make herself scarce if it weren’t ultra-freezing, frost forming on hot pink buck knife cold outside. 

Honestly, she had guessed a long time ago that Professor Dlaun had a boyfriend. Samantha had overheard her on the phone planning an outing that sounded suspiciously like a date a few times. After meeting Professor Xoi and seeing how he and Professor Dlaun acted together, she just _knew_. Even with Professor Dlaun’s missing memory, she still reacted to Professor Xoi in little ways - like now. As Professor Xoi talked to her, the creases in her forehead eased, and her moaning stopped. Peaceful sleep.

“Sooo… how long have you been datin’?” Samantha asked when Professor Xoi finished soothing Professor Dlaun. 

He looked startled. “Um-uh. We aren’t dating. We are really good friends,” he stammered out. “ _Why_ does everyone think we’re dating?” He muttered.

“‘Cause you obviously care deeply for one another and she was the downfall of your last relationship,” Samantha told him matter of factly.

“Emilia was not the downfall of my last relationship. My last relationship failed because she thought she could poach hours in the bio lab from me.”

“Um, I meant the screamin’ end relationship in the quad. Everyone knows that story. It’s a legend on campus.”

The startled look came back to Professor Xoi’s face. “ _Everyone_ blames _Emilia_ for that?” 

Samantha nodded. 

“Shit. Sorry, shouldn’t curse around students. But, crap. _I_ was the reason that relationship failed. I refused to give up a decade-long friendship because of a woman that wanted to be my sole focus. Science is my sole focus and Emilia gets that because she’s the same way.” Professor Xoi sat back on his heels. “So everyone blames Emilia and not science for my relationships failing?”

Samantha nodded again. “So the screamin’ match in tha quad that coined the phrase ‘getting none’ on campus was about _science_ and not Professor Dlaun? Not that it’s my business or anythin’ but I’m curious.”

Professor Xoi nodded. “ _She_ blamed all of the downfalls of our relationship on Emilia and not her trying to grasp my attention from the labs. Most people in the humanities don’t understand how crucial lab time _is_ and that many wanting tenure are willing to do severe harm to others in line. I _know_ that if Dr. Lenox’s lab didn’t come up for another year that Emilia had _plans_ to ensure another lab did become free. She likes Dr. Lenox, or did anyway.”

Samantha was sure that she had a puzzled look on her face.

Professor Xoi answered her unasked question of why. “Dr. Lenox sponsored her doctoral work. Emilia was devastated about his delusional state in the hospital. Maybe he wasn’t delirious? Maybe he was in shock?”

“Yeah, or maybe he wasn’t either. What sounded like delusions might ‘ave been real. I mean, look at Professor Dlaun right now. It’s all pretty Sci-fi if ya ask me, but can either of us say it ain’t happenin’?”

“You’ve got a point there.” Professor Xoi nodded. “Ah, well, it doesn’t really help though.” He rifled his hands through his hair. “Em” he cleared his throat “Emilia never really elaborated on what Dr. Lenox’s ‘delusions’ were - even to me.”

Samantha gave the professor a look. “Ya know, if I’m allowed ta ‘be me’ an’ speak how I want ‘round you and Professor Dlaun, ya can call her ‘Em’ in front of me.”

A few hours later, Professor Dlaun woke up and Professor Xoi explained their current situation and his and Samantha’s thoughts on using the tat- mark.

“I agree. I’ll have to use it.”

“Don’t push yourself, Em.” Professor Xoi passed Professor Dlaun some rations after giving Samantha her share. “Rest for a little longer. If we have to take a risk with the mark, we’re going to make the risk as small as possible. I don’t- we don’t want to see you get hurt or kill yourself from overexertion.

“I’m okay.” Professor Dlaun grimaced at the taste of the rations. “I’ll try when I finish eating. Can you two describe what home is like again?”

“Home is…” Samantha began. “The University of Hawaii at Mānoa. It is on the island of Honolulu in the island chain of Hawaii. It is roughly two kilometers east of the Pacific Ocean. The front of campus has a reddish-brown low wall with the words University of Hawaii Mānoa in black capitalized letters. There is a flowerbed directly behind the wall with two white flag poles to the left of the letters. About twenty feet back from the flowerbed is a building. It has covered hallways held up by pillars. The front pillars are five across and behind and to the right of the letters. The part of the building behind the flagpoles is shorter than the covered hallways and has twenty by four small box windows. There are trees all around and between the flowerbed and the building is grass. The trees are different from the trees here and in Africa. There are palm trees and the other trees don’t look like the trees here. They are taller and a brighter green than these.” 

“I think I got it,” Professor Dlaun said after Samantha’s deluge of information. 

“How did you remember all that?” Professor Xoi whispered into Samantha’s ear.

“I just pictured the memory I had of my first day on campus,” Samantha shrugged. “It was a new life for me so I made sure to make my first memory of this life stick.”

Professor Dlaun scrunched her face up for a moment as if she was thinking really hard about something. Then, all of a sudden, the mark on her forehead started glowing, and everything went dark as a swirling, nauseating sense of falling and being shunted around in a whirlpool at the same time enveloped Samantha and the two professors.

“Em...ake up...ow..re you?”

The first thing Emilia was aware of was Gregory’s voice. The next thing she was aware of was his concerned face and a calming breeze washing over her skin.

“Did it work?”

“Well, there are palm trees.” When Gregory smiled a lopsided grin, Emilia felt her heart skip a beat.

“Yeah, palm trees.” Samantha cut into the conversation. “And mosquitos. And water. But that doesn’t make it Hawaii.”

“So where are we?” Emilia wasn’t sure how to read Samantha’s expression. It felt tense but also strangely calm.

“The Bayou.” 

“Uh…”

“The Louisiana Bayou.”

“Oh.” Emilia didn’t know how to react. That was...definitely unexpected. “Um, how exactly do you know that we are in the Louisiana Bayou?” 

“I…. grew up around here.”

That answer came from Gregory. This felt unexpected to Emilia and she wasn’t sure why it was unexpected from him.

“Do you have an accent too, Professor Xoi?” Samantha asked.

Gregory’s face seemed to go blank. “No,” he replied tersely. “We need to get away from the water and find a town. Someway to get us back to Hawaii without using the mark to travel. I think we can all agree that that is a bad idea.”

Samantha nodded. “Yep. I really don’t wanna meet a crocodile.”

“Alligator.” Gregory corrected. “There aren’t crocodiles in the Bayou. And besides, it’s winter, so as long as none of them are starved, they should be hibernating right now.”

“It’s the ‘should’ that worries me.” Samantha replied. “Anyway, since ya grew up ‘round ‘ere, have ya got any idea how to get out?”

While Gregory was busy explaining to Samantha that just because he grew up in the Bayou it doesn’t mean he knew where in the Bayou they were right now, Emilia started absentmindedly fingering the necklace she was wearing.

Wait. Had she been wearing this the whole time?

Emilia looked down at the necklace and realized it was, in fact, a very beautiful diamond ring on a simple chain.

“Hey, what’s that?” Samantha asked, coming to look. Her eyes widened, and she looked back at Gregory. “So, how long have you been together again?” She asked.

Gregory’s face went red. He didn’t look straight at either of them when he replied. “I proposed last week.”

Samantha started saying something, but Emilia couldn’t clearly make out the words. Her mind felt heavy, and her temple started throbbing. Images and sounds started running through her mind in a dizzying swirl. At first, they were blurry sights and muffled sounds, but they started sharpening, and Emilia began to realize they were memories.

She was alone when a hand landed on her shoulder and Gregory’s face popped into her field of vision with a lopsided grin. Then they were in a lab - her lab - chatting and eating lunch. She was curled up on the couch crying her eyes out and then he was there, arms around her, making her feel like things would be okay. So many small moments, and some longer. There were arguments, but there were also apologies. Tension never lasted. They were friends, and they were more than that too.

And then there he was, awkwardly stumbling over words and face blushing madly while she held a ring that had fallen out of his lab coat’s pocket. Frozen for a moment, then she hugged him, nearly knocking him off his feet, as she mumbled yes over and over.

She belonged here. Home wasn’t her lab. It wasn’t the school. It wasn’t an apartment or a house. _Home_ was by his side, in his arms.

Emilia felt energy radiating from her, but it wasn’t draining her this time. She felt dizzy, but only for a moment. Then her vision cleared.

“Where-“ Emilia saw Samantha’s eyes bug out of her head “we didn’t just break inta somebody’s house, right?”

The trio stood in a cozy living room with multiple bookcases crammed along the wall, a loveseat and a couch nestled around a short coffee table, and a big bay window with a view of the ocean.

“No.” Emilia felt confident for the first time in a while. “We’re home.”

“Home? Whose home?” Samantha demanded.

“Ours.” Emilia and Greg responded simultaneously.

“Soooo, how close to the university are we?”

“It’s a five-minute drive,” Greg answered. “But I think both of our cars are on campus so we’ll have to hitch a ride on the bus.”

“I always lived in the dorms and didn’t leave campus much. How much is the bus?”

“I have no idea. I always drove.”

Emilia thought for a moment. “I think my purse is still in the lab - assuming it wasn’t destroyed in the explosion.”

“Same here.” Samantha said, then froze. “Wait, did you get your memories back?”

Emilia nodded. “It’s not all back, but a lot of it is - the important parts anyway.” She glanced at Greg.

Samantha looked between the two professors. “So, you’re telling me we probably woulda been home days ago if Professor Xoi ‘ad just told ya from the beginnin’ that the two a you were a thing?!”

“Or it could have made her powers go out of control and hurt everyone.” Greg responded defensively. “Besides, it seemed to hurt her when she tried to remember things, so…”

Emilia smiled. That was just like Greg. “At any rate,” she cut in, “Greg, do you have your wallet on you? From what I recall, neither of us really keep cash lying around aside from your wallet and my purse which is potentially in little bits right now.”

Greg shook his head. “I lost it before I found you and Samantha back when we were split up. And considering the swim I took in the river while I was trying to find you, I don’t think the cash in it would be usable even if it were here.”

“Then I guess we’re walking.” Emilia stated. “It’s only about a half-hour by foot, so it should seem pretty easy compared to the walking you’ve both done over the past several days.” She paused. “The only thing is, what do we do when we get to the University?”

They all stared at each other for a moment before Greg spoke up. “Maybe before we head back to the lab we should have a proper meal and talk about our options.” He paused for a moment. “Em, do you remember your conversation with Dr. Lenox?”


	11. 12 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day tweleve: more backstory! -ish

12 October 2020  
Emilia didn’t look puzzled by the question. “I do remember Dr. Lenox. His delusion was that his entire team was transported to another dimension by marks on every third person.”

“Marks like that one?” Samantha asked, pointing at Emilia’s forehead.

Emilia nodded. “But none of them had the marks when they got back. He said one day after they had ‘finished their task’ that the marks just disappeared in a wave of bright light and they were all transported back to the lab.”

“Task?” Greg asked.

Emilia shook her head. “He never specified. In fact, when I asked him about it, he vehemently refused to say anymore other than ‘no one should ever know what we went through - what we had to do.’ At the time it just made him seem crazier, but now…”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” Greg replied.

“Soooo,” Samantha cut in, “you mean you’re still gonna have that mark thingy and the creepy powers until we go back ta Africa an’ deal with whatever wacky task was set up for us?”

“Probably, yes.” Emilia replied.

The three were silent for a moment, all thinking about the implications of this.

After a minute, Greg spoke up. “There’s actually something else I’m concerned about.” He looked at Emilia. “You said Dr. Lenox told you they were sent to ‘another dimension.’ So, why were we sent to Africa, a place in _our dimension_?”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Samantha waved her hands. “I know this is all a Sci-fi scenario, but are we really sayin’ there are other dimensions?”

“Yes.” Emilia and Greg replied in unison.

“In fact, Dr. Lenox was studying the possibility of alternate dimensions, parallel timelines, and contusions in the space-time continuum.” Emilia continued. “The machine in the lab was supposed to be the product of his research. Though, before the accident, he was always concerned about it, saying there were lots of things that needed tweaking and gaps in the research that needed filled in. After the accident…” she paused, took a deep breath, and resumed. “After the accident he said it should be scrapped entirely. I thought it was… I had decided to follow up on his research, to show him that it was… I didn’t want to see him give up. It was - hard to see him like that.”

Greg placed a hand on her shoulder. “I know. It’s okay.” He moved to take her hand in his. “That’s why I pushed the button. I saw you day after day pushing yourself to try and finish his research, and I thought - you had been stuck on one small thing for weeks. I thought if we did a test run then maybe…”

“I’ll just go in the other room while you two talk this out.” Samantha cut in. “This way?” She asked, pointing at a simple wooden door a few feet behind the couch.

Emilia nodded. “Thanks Samantha. That leads to the hall. The third door on the right is a guest room. You’re welcome to it.”

“Actually,” Greg added, “why don’t we make that your room for now - at least until the whole Sci-fi adventure gets sorted out.”

“That’s a great idea.” Emilia agreed. “It’ll be easier to work this out if we are all together.”

Samantha stared at the two professors for a moment. “Right.” She gave a half-laugh. “And I thought I was the weird one here.” She paused a moment and shook her head. “Then again, I take that back. The moment that mark appeared I stopped bein’ the weird one.”


	12. 13 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day thirteen: POV change!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments while writing this fic: "Today is so short because we are all grad students and there is a lot of work due." "We are all grad students and there is a lot of work to do but I'm going to write!"

13 October 2020

Samantha had to admit, the Professors had nice taste. The guest room was decorated in a cozy style and provided two large, double-wide bookshelves, a writing desk with space for a laptop (and a surge-protected power strip to plug in) and a comfortable rolling chair, a big comfy chair by the window - perfect for curling up with a book - a queen size bed with sheets and a light blanket (additional blankets and a comforter were stored on the top shelf in the closet), a dresser, and some nature-themed wall art. The colors were not too drab nor too exaggerated, and the rich wood floor had soft rugs between the bed, dresser, and desk.


	13. 14-16 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Days fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic:  
> "Okay, I need to reread this." "Sorry, not sorry." "Okay, I'm just going to abridge that conversation."

14 October 2020

As Samantha left the room, Greg and Emilia continued talking about why he thought it was a great idea to push a button marked “Do NOT Push.”

15 October 2020

16 October 2020

After some time and a fair bit of back and forth, Emilia and Greg had come to the conclusion that they were both at fault - Greg for pushing the button without first discussing it with Emilia and Emilia for not talking to Greg before it came to that point when she was so stressed out - and both not at fault: neither could have predicted this. 

They had also determined that the first order of business was to determine if they were actually back. There was, in their opinions, a high probability that - if they had been sent to an alternate dimension as had happened to Dr. Lenox - they could not force the mark to send them back without completing their “task” - whatever it may be, especially considering that Emilia still had the mark. But, they wouldn’t tell Samantha until they were sure this was actually a different dimension. The possibility seemed to shake her up quite a bit, and it was important for all of them to be as calm as possible.


	14. 17 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day seventeen: is this an alternate dimension?

17 October 2020

There were a few possible ways they could potentially figure out if this was a different dimension, but proving it wasn’t a different dimension would be an entirely different matter. If the two dimensions were almost identical, then…

Well, they would cross that bridge when they came to it. While Samantha was occupied exploring her new guest room, Emilia and Greg set to work testing their dimension. While they didn’t have their laptops - they were likely still at the campus if they had survived the explosion - they did have a home desktop computer. They didn’t use it much, but they had both agreed that it was good to have one at least as a backup in case one or both of their laptops went on the fritz. Emilia’s job was to log into her email account and check for anything out of the ordinary before searching online news about the explosion or anything else related to the university. Meanwhile, Greg was going to go channel surfing on the living room television set, especially focusing on newscasts, but also looking for other potential discrepancies.

“We’ve time-traveled or we’re in a dimension that runs slower than ours,” Emilia said, from the already booted computer. 

“Why?” Greg stopped, turning to look at Emilia. 

“Look at the date and time.”

“We’re THREE days before the explosion!” He exploded, looking to Emilia for more physics-based answers.

Emilia got a horrified look on her face. “What if this is our dimension and we run into our past selves?”

Greg looked equally horrified. 

Another terrible thought occurred to Emilia. “What if we took our dimensional analogues’ places in this dimension?” She whispered lowly, “What if every jump we made swapped our places for our analogues’?” A long pause happened as Emilia tried to formulate the horror if this happened. “We’ve jumped four times. What if we are four infinite dimensions away from our home dimension? How will we get home?”

Greg was silent.

“Greg,” Emilia began again after she paused to compose herself, “what do we tell Samantha?”

About that time, there was a rustling sound outside the front door.  
“Em, are you going to be at the lab again tomorrow?” Greg’s voice drifted through the door accompanied by the sound of a key turning in the lock.

Greg and Emilia looked at each other. 

This was bad.

“Turn off the computer. I’ll put the remote back…” Greg whisper-shouted at Emilia as the two rushed to beat the opening of the door.

“Yes,” Emilia’s voice drifted through the solid wood, and the door creaked open. “I have to run some more tests on the monkeys.”

Wait.

_Monkeys?_

Greg looked at Emilia. Emilia looked at Greg. Neither one of them had ever done research on _monkeys_.

Not having the time to deal with this now, Emilia and Greg rushed to put everything back in order.

“Samantha!” Greg whisper-shouted as they finished “She’s still in the guest room!”

The two dashed for the guest room, hoping that it still was a guest room, and barely closed the door as they heard the front door creak open. Greg clapped a hand on a startled Samantha’s mouth.


	15. 18 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day eighteen: Escaping other dimensional selves

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments while writing this fic:  
> Sinsrfun10: "It's been six days."  
> Laicolasse: "No, it's been at least 12 days."  
> Sinsrfun10: "I'm not changing the six in the list. Will putting at least work?"  
> Laicolasse: "Fine."

18 October 2020

Samantha briefly attempted to get out of his hold but his harsh whisper made her stop. 

“Be quiet. We’re in a different dimension and our analogues are _here_.”

Samantha nodded to Emilia’s relief and Greg continued.

“We have to get out of here.”

Emilia gestured to the guest room window which opened up a few feet off the ground, but was easily accessible to climb out of. The only problem with the window was that it faced the street. _Anyone_ could see them climbing out and if someone was watching, they would have seen doubles walking in the house in different clothes and the woman without a tattoo on her forehead. 

They sent Samantha out the window first, because Emilia figured that Samantha would be the most agile and used to climbing. Greg was next. Emilia thought it was so that he could catch her if she fell out. They were both successful. Emilia also climbed out the window successfully but had the sudden urge to make a new list of things the group knew.

1\. They were in a different dimension  
2\. Emilia did an experiment with monkeys in this dimension  
3\. The date in this dimension is at least six days total ahead of the group’s lived time  
4\. She and Greg are engaged  
5\. Greg blew up Emilia’s lab due to stress  
6\. Emilia healed Samantha  
7\. Samantha?

Actually, that was an important question. Where was the Samantha of this dimension? 

If Emilia was doing experiments on monkeys in this dimension, it seemed unlikely that Samantha would still be her student - well the Samantha from her original dimension wasn’t likely to work with her in this dimension if she was doing monkey experiments, but then Emilia didn’t like the idea of herself doing experiments with monkeys, so maybe this dimension’s Samantha was working with this dimension’s Emilia.

Okay, there had to be a better and less clunky way to refer to this dimension’s people. AD? For Alternate Dimension?


	16. 19 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day nineteen: Samantha's pov

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic:   
> Laicolasse: "I have to laugh. I accidentally mistyped “beer” and autocorrect had “helpfully” changed it to “bear”"

19 October 2020  
Samantha was freaking out. They were in an alternate dimension. THEY WERE IN AN ALTERNATE DIMENSION! WHY AREN’T THE PROFESSORS FREAKING OUT?!

Then Samantha heard them. She heard the two people inside the house. They were talking, almost yelling about ethical experimentation. The woman was loudly telling the man off about messing with her experiments and the man kept retorting back about how “her experiments weren’t going anywhere useful anyway.” Samantha saw both of her professors flinch on that line though. 

Samantha carefully peeled Professor Xoi’s hand off her face. “I think they are yelling at each other too much to realize we are here. Who are they and why did we have to leave a nice beautiful bed behind?”

“They’re us,” Professor Dlaun muttered. “They’re us, but different. _That_ Emilia is a biologist, I think. The yelling about monkey experiments shows that to us. We don’t know what specialty AD Greg has, but it is still probably Bio based on their argument.”

“AD?” Samantha inquired.

“Alternate Dimension.”

“Oh.” Samantha looked around at their environment. “What should we do now? Should we find me?”

“Maybe.” Professor Dlaun replied. “It would be useful to know where AD Samantha is so we can avoid her, but we might also want to avoid looking and just take emergency measures if it comes up.”

Professor Xoi nodded. “True, it’s a difficult decision. Either way, we need to get away from here.” He signaled their immediate vicinity which was along a street with cars passing by every so often. Thankfully, none had passed by when the three climbed out of the window.

Samantha took in their surroundings and then froze when her eyes set on the street sign. “Uh, we may ‘ave a problem here.” She stated. “My cousin lives on this street - at least if this dimension is the same as ours.” She paused. “And we don’t get along.”

“Sammy!” A rotund man with what could only be described as a beer belly came around the corner walking a tiny white fluff ball of a dog on a hot pink leash just as Samantha finished speaking. “I’m glad I ran into you!”

Samantha tensed and prepared to run. She was confused about Mason’s cheerful tone, as she had only ever heard him yelling at her even at formal social gatherings, and the fluff ball was nothing like the enormous pit bull Gobber he normally had with him, but maybe this was just a new tactic. 

“I forgot to give ya somethin’” he reached into his pocket as he stepped forward. Samantha was grateful when her two professors stepped between her and Mason. 

“Can it wait for another time?” Professor Xoi inquired. “We were having an important discussion.”

“Oh, yeah sure.” Mason looked a bit awkward. “‘s long as Sammy’s not worried ‘bout it right now. I forgot ta give her my half a the rent before she left for school.”

Samantha couldn’t believe her ears. Mason had never given her money, _ever_. The very short period of time that she had lived with him, he had made her pay the entire rent as well as cover the expense of groceries and _his_ beer.


	17. 20 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty of writing: Samantha now knows its a different dimension

20 October 2020

It’s why she moved out so quickly after finishing community college and into the dorms. She would much rather live on campus than with Mason. And yet, here he was walking a little ball of fluff, cheerfully greeting her, and even _giving_ her money.

_Now_ she had seen everything.

If Samantha had been unsure that this was an alternate dimension before, she sure wasn’t now. “Uh, yeah, just give it ta me next time…” Samantha paused. She was having a moral dilemma. Technically, it wasn’t her money - it was AD Samantha’s, so she _should_ tell AD Mason to give it to her later so that AD Samantha would get it. _But_ , Professor Xoi, Professor Dlaun, and herself were currently stuck in an alternate dimension with _no money_.

What would the professors tell her to do? She figured they’d have debated about the morals of taking the money, factoring in the need to survive, and the probability of causing some weird dimensional rift.

You know what? Dimensional rifts didn’t sound fun. Samantha’s made do without before. She could help the professors figure this out. No dimensional rifts. Nope. No thank ya.


	18. 21 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-one: Samantha is not happy with her dimensional self

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "I made a decision." "So? That doesn't mean I have to." "We will never speak of this again." "I'm quite satisfied with myself." "I'm scared now."

21 October 2020

As they walked away from Samantha’s cousin, Emilia got a sudden insight into Samantha’s family situation. It was none of her business so she wasn’t going to ask Samantha about her relationship with her cousin. 

“Soo…. that’s your cousin?” Greg asked, and Emilia sighed on the inside.

“Yes.” Samantha looked at Greg. “I think I like him better in this dimension though. In our home dimension, he owes me at least a grand.”

There was a pregnant pause where Emilia glared at her fiancé. Luckily, Samantha was oblivious to the tension between the engaged professors and redirected the group to focus on what’s important.

“Where are we going and how are we going to do it? We have no money,” Samantha pointed out. 

Emilia looked at Greg, and he nodded at her. “To find Dr. Lenox.”

Samantha looked at her like she was nuts.

“If AD Dr. Lenox is anything like Dr. Lenox from our dimension, he’s the best chance we have of figuring out what to do next.” Greg explained.

“And if he ain’t?” Samantha questioned.

Greg shrugged. “We go busking? Em can sing pretty well.”

“Thanks, but I think I’d rather see you go busking.” Emilia retorted. “Your dancing will definitely turn some heads, Greg.”

For sure,” Greg replied sarcastically, rolling his eyes. “Samantha, do you have any special talents for busking?”

Samantha got a faraway look on her face at Greg’s question. “I don’t have the tools for it here.” She replied in an odd monotone. 

Emilia looked at Greg in horror. ‘How does he keep stepping in landmines around her?’

Samantha began to become more lively and asked them the best way to find Dr. Lenox.

“His lab.” “My lab.” The professors replied simultaneously. 

“Well, hopefully, he _hasn’t_ had the accident that gave me the lab in this dimension. And hopefully, he is running the same experiments as in _our_ dimension,” Emilia continued. 

The three dimensional travelers focused their walking toward the college campus and more specifically the science buildings. Their walk was picturesque but fraught with danger--the danger of being seen, the danger of being questioned, the danger of the mark. This perilous journey took a little over a half-hour because all three of them were now terrified of meeting Samantha’s analogue and anyone else they knew. 

As if on cue, AD Samantha showed up right outside the lab building. Luckily, Greg had spotted her moments before she rounded the corner and dragged Samantha and Emilia behind a nearby stand of trees which was, luckily, just big enough to hide them all.

“Yeah,” AD Samantha was saying into a bright pink cellphone (at least her favorite color seemed to be the same), “I’m passing by the science labs now.” After a pause, she continued. “Mm. Just let me call Mason and let him know I’ll be spending the night out - you know how he worries.”

Emilia glanced at Samantha to see how she was faring with the strangeness of seeing her AD self. She was handling it surprisingly well…

Just as she was thinking that, Emilia swallowed her words.

AD Samantha giggled - flirtatious giggling. “Okay. Yeah, see you then, Kyle.”

Samantha blanched and stared at her AD self as if the world had just ended. “No way.” She mumbled. “No freakin’ way!” She shouted, Greg and Emilia covering her mouth as quickly as they could.

AD Samantha, having been startled by the scream most likely, headed toward the trees the three were hiding behind. “Kyle, I’ll call you back.”

Emilia froze for a moment. This was not good. But then Greg caught her attention, and the look in his eye told her what to do. 

She squealed, shouted “yes” and reached toward Greg, squishing Samantha between them. Greg put his arms around her too, and - thankfully - Samantha caught on and made herself as small as possible so Emilia and Greg would look like a couple celebrating their engagement and not two professors trying to hide a student. 

Hopefully.

“Oh, sorry. Thought I heard something… else” AD Samantha’s face turned bright red as she slowly backed away. She ran so fast toward the entrance of the university, that she nearly left streaks of pink behind from her hot-pink backpack.

Samantha exploded. “SHE’S WITH KYLE! KYLE, THE BACKSTABBING TRAITOR OF A FRIEND THAT STOLE MY PAPER BEFORE I TURNED IT IN AND CHEATED ON SO MANY PEOPLE KYLE! I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT SHE’S SO DUMB TO DATE THAT-THAT--” Emilia grabbed Samantha and shook her gently, breaking the screaming fit.

Are you good now?” Emilia asked, after Samantha’s breathing calmed to a more normal rate.

“No.” Samantha replied, but nonetheless she was _much_ calmer than before.

“Well,” Greg said, trying to break the tension, “AD Mason’s a better person than Mason, so maybe AD Kyle is better than Kyle too.”

Samantha nodded. “He’d better be.”

After a moment, the three walked out from behind the trees and headed toward the lab building. Emilia led the way, but all three of them knew where they were going - they were there quite often after all.

“Well, this is the right place, but…” Emilia didn’t know quite how to finish her thought.

“Yeah,” Greg nodded, “I get what you mean.”

Samantha looked between the two professors. “I get it. The name on the plaque isn’t Dr. Lenox. So he’s not in this lab in this dimension. Lot’s of things aren’t right ‘ere, so what’s the problem?”

Emilia pointed to the plaque which read _Dr. Milern_ “That’s the problem.”

Samantha shrugged. “I’ve never heard of Dr. Milern before, so I don’t get it.”

“Yes you have.” Greg replied. “You just didn’t know that was her last name.”

“‘Kay, so who is she?” 

“Do you remember hearing about the incident with the elephant, the lab rat, and a box of fireworks?” Emilia shivered just thinking about it. “Or the incident with a boa constrictor, and the women’s basketball team?”

“Oh, or the incident with the giraffe and the Provost’s not-so-secret stash of expensive wine?” Greg added.

By this point, Samantha’s eyes had grown round as saucers. “ _Her_?! You mean the _Incidents of Isabella_ is a real thing? I thought she was an urban legend?”

“Nope,” Greg replied. “ _She_ is a very real scientist with a very real insatiable curiosity. She gets more ethics violations than any other scientist I know. And it’s typically because of something that happened _on accident_ than any real intention.”

Emilia continued. “I did my undergrad with her. We had a great time as lab partners in the upper-division physics courses.”

As Emilia was saying this, Greg was shaking his head in a vigorous no that Emilia saw and called him out on.

“Undergrad was _not_ fun with Isabella Milern or with Isaac Usher. Both of them were maniacs then that almost blew themselves and the school up on five separate occasions! I hated when you hung out with them. And no it was _not_ a jealousy thing!” Greg argued, continuing an old familiar argument that has been played out ever since Isabella got a job at Mānoa. 

“And I told you that her doctorate has calmed her down _a lot_.”

“How are the three incidents named calming down?” He retorted.

“She didn’t almost blow up the school on _any_ of those occasions,” was Emilia’s prompt reply.

The lab door opened. A woman with dark brown curly hair and dark skin stood in the open doorway. The three dimensional travelers froze in horror.

“What’s the ruckus out here?” The woman paused and recognized all three of the travelers. “Professor Dlaun,” she began very professionally, “why is there a tattoo on your face that wasn’t there two hours ago when you closed your lab for the day? And Professor Xoi, why on earth are you on campus? You were sent home to sleep by me and your fiancée.” The woman paused on Samantha. “Samantha, my favorite student. Where is the lab report you promised me would be finished the next time I saw you?”

“Isabella,” Emilia began.

“Dr. Milern, Professor.”

“Dr. Milern, by any chance did this lab used to be Dr. Lenox’s? And also, are you attempting to recreate any of his experiments?”

Dr. Milern’s jaw dropped. Her question was low and horrified. “How did you know?” 

Samantha bravely opened her mouth and squeaked. Her face turned a horrible shade of red and Emilia felt second-hand embarrassment for her. Emilia continued talking after she realized that Greg wasn’t even going to try to attempt talking to an AD colleague. 

“We aren’t from here.” Emilia gestured to the lab and asked, “Can we talk in the lab _far away_ from any buttons on the control panel?” The last part was glared at her fiancé. “It is kind of a sensitive situation.”

Dr. Milern thought it over for a moment and responded, “We’ll go to my office. I’m in the next hallway on the left.”


	19. 22 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-two: Dr. Milern's experiments are worse...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "Your phones are stupid." "I agree."  
> "She made it worse. I made it even worse." "How on Earth are we going to find an ending for this thing?"  
> "BTW I was a little mean.... *evil laughter*"

22 October 2020

Okay, so when AD Dr. Milern said she really was trying to recreate AD Dr. Lenox’s experiments, Greg thought that for sure they had actually made some progress. Sure, he was horrified that Dr. Milern of all people was who they had to rely on, but he was hoping that the AD Dr. Milern was more responsible…

But, no.

Not only was AD Dr. Milern not actually going to be useful to them, she was definitely going to make things worse. And AD Dr. Lenox was downright frightening. Apparently, the two were engaging in alchemy - more specifically in the theory of human transmutation - and AD Dr. Milern thought the three of them were successful ‘creations.’

Just great.

Gregory usually didn’t like assuming what others would think, but in this case he was absolutely certain that Em and Samantha would agree with him: this was _**NOT** _what any of them had been expecting.__

__This lab had always been unusual. And weird. And a little creepy. But this? This was a whole new level._ _

__Greg looked over at Em and at the horror and shock on her face. The shaking of her head confused him for a minute, but then he realized, _‘This wasn’t what she had been working on in their dimension.’_ _ _

__AD Dr. Milern droned on in her excitement while Greg came to the horrifying conclusion that AD Greg might be autopsying him and his two companions to study what made them different. Then Samantha spoke._ _

__“You think _you_ created us? Is this another prank Dr. Milern? You are known for them after all,” the young woman spoke confidently._ _

__Dr. Milern froze in shock. Greg parsed the look on her face as… offended?_ _

__“I beg your pardon? I have never pulled a prank in my life,” condescension dripped from every syllable toward the college student._ _

__“Oh so the _Incidents of Isabella_ aren’t a thing here? Darn, I really enjoyed the story about the student fair with the mongooses and the rampaging balloon animals. Yo, prof what’s your favorite _Isabella Incident_?” Samantha directed her question at Em._ _

__Em responded with the story that always gave Greg nightmares after it rose from the repressed parts of his memory._ _

__“The time in undergrad where we dropped items that we shaped or painted into brick-looking things off the top of the tallest building on campus to record what gravity did to the various items.”_ _

__“What was so bad about that?”_ _

__Greg cut in, “Because they almost killed me and two professors because the three amigos forgot to mark the drop area.”_ _

__AD Dr. Milern interrupted story time with, “I didn’t do undergrad with Professors Dlaun and Xoi. I went to Yale.”_ _

__“Yale?!” Em exclaimed. “You _always_ thought that the Yaleians were stuck-up prigs! What the heck Bella!”_ _

__AD Dr. Milern was now looking furious._ _

__And confused._ _

__And _furious_._ _

__“Give me a moment.” She ground out before picking up the office telephone and dialing. “Dr. Lenox,” She spoke - or yelled rather - into the receiver, “What did you do?!”_ _

__Greg glanced at Em. She nodded. The two professors each hooked an arm around Samantha and bolted for the door, with a furious Dr. Milern hot on their heels._ _

__“Now what?” Samantha asked, shaking the two off and running on her own._ _

__“To the lab!” Em replied hastily. The three ran down the corridor as fast as they humanly could, and Greg hoped, before the creepy black tentacles would start shooting out of Em’s forehead in the middle of the university._ _

__Her forehead was already glowing when they dashed through the lab door and shut it in Dr. Milern’s face, leaning heavily against it to prevent the mad - in both senses of the word - woman from coming in._ _

__What they hadn’t counted on was the sight that awaited them in an alchemy lab dedicated to human transmutation. It was beyond imagination._ _

__AD Dr. Lenox was there and directing the blank-stared students like he was a conductor for a symphony that had a choir with it. Lots of arm-waving and pointing. He didn’t even notice the three dimensional travelers slamming the door shut. The students had surrounded a person strapped to a table. Greg barely heard Samantha’s broken horrified whisper of “Kyle?” before he could no longer see the lab anymore._ _

__“Where are we?” Em groaned. ‘Her recovery time is getting faster.’ Greg thought._ _

__Greg looked around after ensuring that only Samantha and Em were in the party. He _did not_ want to travel dimensions with the crazy doctors they were just with. The landscape was sparse but with trees. Trees that seemed familiar somehow…._ _

__They were back in Africa! Hopefully they can finish this stupid mark-induced task and _go home _!___ _

____“We are in Africa. We need to figure out the task so we can go home,” Greg said confidently._ _ _ _

____“And how exactly do we do that?” Em replied, her question serious but her tone was sassy._ _ _ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The redacted whole is a must see, especially for the evil laughter in this chapter.


	20. 23 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-three: back in Africa

23 October 2020

“Retrace our steps?” Greg asked more than stated. “Maybe we were sent to the place where we were supposed to find our task when we first arrived.”

Em nodded. “I don’t have very clear memories of that time since I was unconscious for most of it, so the two of you will have to lead the way.”

Em glanced at Samantha who was sitting on the ground, not participating in the conversation. Greg followed her gaze. The young woman seemed truly traumatized this time. He sighed.

“Then again, maybe that’s our first step.”

Em nodded and the two went over to kneel by Samantha’s side.

“What can we do, Samantha?” Em’s gentle voice could have calmed an angry gorilla in Greg’s opinion.

Samantha looked up at the two professors. “I quit.” 

Greg exchanged confused glances with Em. “What?”

“I said,” Samantha repeated a bit louder, “I quit. This freakin’ thing’s gone TOO far now, and I ain’t dealin’ with it no more! _KYLE_ of all people! An’ now we’re back in FRIGGIN’ AFRICA! An’ what’re we ta do ‘ere? FIGURE IT OUT?!” Her frantic shouting calmed down at the end. “I quit.”

“Samantha,” Em placed a hesitant hand on the young woman’s shoulder. “I get it. This is all too much, but none of us has the option to quit here. Let’s prove those horrible people don’t know anything by surviving and making it back home.”

Greg nodded. “Yeah, and if that fails we can find our way back to this dimension’s university and have Em smack them a new one with her tentacles.” Though he said that, he _really_ didn’t want to do so. He hoped his hesitance didn’t come through in his words though, for Samantha and Em’s sakes.

“What’s this, then.” Samantha laughed - a strained laugh, but a laugh. “Good cop, sarcastic cop?” She stood up and pulled her hot pink buck knife out of her pocket. “Alrighty, then, let’s go.”

It took a while, but eventually the group reached the cabin where they had taken shelter upon first arriving in Africa. It was just as dilapidated as Gregory remembered it. Still, this was the best clue they had about what they needed to do to get back to their dimension, so the group decided to search the cabin for anything they might have missed the first time they were here.  
After thoroughly searching inside and out twice, Gregory was almost ready to give up, and he guessed from Em’s depressed look and Samantha’s increasing agitated muttering that they were not any more optimistic than he was that they would find something. He was about to call a strategy meeting when he noticed something peculiar.

“Em” he called “could you take two steps back?”

“Uh, sure.” She looked puzzled, but complied. 

“And two steps forward?”

“Okay...”

“Again.”

“Why shoul-”

“Please?”

“Fine.”

Yup. He was sure of it.

“So, are you going to tell me why I’m walking back and forth?”

“Maybe he finds it amusing.” Samantha cut in.

“The mark glows.” Em and Samantha looked at him like he was an idiot.

“Yeah, we know.”

“No, I mean, ugh. Look.” Gregory grabbed Em and pulled her back and forth a few times while Samantha watched.

“Oh.”

“Uh, guys? Can’t see my own forehead.”

“Sorry.” Gregory stopped pulling her back and forth. “It glows a little bit when you move here and fades when you move back.”

“And you think it might be indicating something.” Em said slowly. 

“So yer sayin’ Professor Dlaun’s mark is acting like a metal detector.” Samantha did not look amused. “Except it’s telling us where to go instead of where pennies got stuck in the sand.”


	21. 24 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-four: a little insight into our youngest character

24 October 2020

Internally Samantha was overwhelmed and trying not to laugh hysterically. “I hated family trips hunting for metal,” she muttered, inaudible to the professors with her. She tried deep breathing to calm herself down. She knew that her professors already thought that she was cracking under the strain of this dimensional adventure, which she was, but she was trying to actively lie to herself. It wasn’t working very well. 

When Samantha looked up, both of her professors were looking at her in concern. It was uber creepy with the glowing mark next to Professor Dlaun’s eyes full of concern. ‘I really hope that I am not in the horror movie trope. I would be the one to live. The professors are dating and I’m a single and intelligent female. Crap,’ “I _will_ be the traumatized survivor at the end of this won’t I?”

“What was that Samantha?” Professor Xoi asked. 

“Um...I got side-tracked with horror movie--” Professor Dlaun finished Samantha’s thought, upping the creepy factor by at least 10.

“Horror movie tropes?” Professor Dlaun thought about it for a moment and came to the same conclusion that Samantha had. Professor Dlaun’s eyes widened and mouth opened in shock, which again added to the creepy factor of the mark.

Samantha turned herself away from looking at Professor Dlaun. She could see that Professor Xoi was holding himself stiffly to prevent the same reaction. Professor Dlaun expressed her confusion. 

Samantha and Professor Xoi exchanged an uncomfortable glance. Luckily for Samantha, Professor Xoi’s relationship mandated him to explain exactly _why_ Samantha could not bear to look at her favorite professor. 

“I look CREEPY?!” Professor Dlaun yelled. “ME EXPRESSING EMOTIONS LOOKS _CREEPY_?!”

“Yes.” came Professor Xoi’s blunt answer. He sighed and continued, “The faster that we complete this task, the faster the mark is no longer on your face, making you look creepy.”

“Fine. Guide me,” she ordered him. 

Professor Xoi took Professor Dlaun by the hand and began guiding her around the dilapidated cabin, glancing back and forth between where they were going and Professor Dlaun’s forehead… and her lips if Samantha’s eyes weren’t deceiving her - something she was becoming less and less sure of these days.  
Well, this was probably true though.

At any rate, Samantha followed the professors about, hot pink buck knife in hand. They trekked from the dilapidated cabin out to a dried up well that Samantha remembered checking what seemed like ages ago now before sending Professor Xoi to the river for water. As the trio approached the well, Professor Dlaun’s mark glowed really, really brightly and a black tendril shot out and down to the bottom of the well before pulling something small out and dropping it into Professor Xoi’s hands.

“Oh, great, now we’re fishing.” Samantha rolled her eyes. “What did the tendril yank out o’ the well?”

Professor Xoi didn’t answer. He was staring at the object in his hands with a look of pure horror on his face. Samantha had a hard time understanding this since to her it just looked like a box. A fancy wood box in surprisingly good condition, but still a box.


	22. 25 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-five: Alternate WWII history

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "*while reading out loud* Big black chunk." "Shut up. I still haven't gotten past 'It begins in World War II'"  
> "Forget that he was eaten; the problem was he was the best mechanic."

25 October 2020

The box looked like a simple puzzle box, but Greg knew better. He heard stories from the men on the African front in World War II about this box and the horrors contained within it. 

“Whatever you do, you _will_ not open that box,” he said, startling Samantha with his tone and snatching Em out of the trance that she was in just _looking_ at the box and causing her to pick it up. 

“What’s in there?” Samantha asked. A curious look stole over her face.

“No! Don’t open the box!” Greg shouted, grabbing the box back from Em. 

Now Em began to look at him like he was crazy, which if dealing with dimensional travel didn’t make you crazy, what did?

Greg had a white-knuckle two-handed grip on the box. He looked down at it to make sure that he couldn’t open it with his tight hold. He looked up at the women with him and let out a deep heavy sigh at the looks on their faces. He knew he had to explain. He did _not_ want to tell this story. He had to anyway.

“It begins in World War II. Many of my family members and people from my hometown were stationed on the African front. They would tell a story of a devil box. A box so beautiful and complex that you just _had_ to try and open it. No one in their camp could open it, so it stayed on the commander’s desk, waiting for an unsuspecting curious fool to open it and release the horrors inside. 

“The camp got a resupply of men and other goods one day a one month into this camp’s existence. One of the new men was smart. He could easily figure out engines and liked putting puzzles together in his free time back home. He saw the box. He asked what was in it and no one could respond. He asked the commander if _he_ could try to puzzle it out. 

“He opened it that night,” Greg’s voice was hoarse and haunted in his retelling of the story. His eyes were staring blankly past Samantha and Em, but they were riveted to his face.

“Every man in that camp had the same nightmare; the man who opened the box was eaten by a monster inside. No one ever saw that man again. This was a bad thing because he was the best mechanic at the camp and his ability to fix engines saved many lives before the box. 

“My great-grandfather drew the box in a letter back home to my great-grandma. That letter was sent out before the box was opened. He told my great-grandma in a later letter to never let him see that picture again if he made it back home. He told her the box was a curse and that no one should ever know of it ever again. Great-grandfather made it home, but closed wooden boxes were not allowed in his house _ever_. Many of the men he served with had the same reaction. All the stores in our town refused to sell closed-top wooden boxes ever again.”

Greg’s voice stopped. He was lost in the memory of him bringing an innocent puzzle box into his great-grandparent’s home. His great-grandfather was furious and destroyed the box. Greg was heart-broken, then his great-grandma told him the story of the puzzle box and showed him the letters. Greg understood then and he acquired his great-grandfather’s fear.

Samantha’s voice broke into his thoughts. “What happened to the original box?”

“That box?” Greg let out a bit of nervous laughter. “The next day, the mechanic’s sergeant reported him missing. A search party had gathered for the mechanic. No one would believe that he would go AWOL. He loved working on engines too much. The search party found the box, intact but closed. Nearby was the mechanic’s tags. Everyone knew then that the camp-wide nightmare was _true_. Every man in that camp attempted to destroy that box. Nothing worked. They eventually threw it down a defunct well. And then blew the well shut.” There was a long pause. “It was probably this well. Though this well seems very open to me.”


	23. 26-30 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day twenty-six: It really is alternate WWII  
> There was no writing on days twenty-seven through thirty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "This is in fact being confirmed as an alternate dimension." "Why are you telling me this? That could be blocked out - no, wait that's setting information. That's against the rules."

26 October 2020

“Well, maybe in _our _dimension they did blow it shut.” Em supplied. “But in _this_ dimension it wasn’t blown shut for whatever reason.” She paused. “The better question is how this box is related to our ‘task’ - whatever it is.”__

__“Isn’t that one obvious though?” Samantha cut in, opening her hot pink buck knife to expose the blade as she did so. “We gotta destroy that people-eating-monster-thingy.”_ _

__“NO!” Greg jerked back and started sprinting away from Samantha as fast as he could. He would drown the box in the river before letting anyone open it._ _

__

__27 October 2020_ _

__28 October 2020_ _

__29 October 2020_ _

__30 October 2020_ _


	24. 31 October 2020

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The last day of writing!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments made while writing this fic: "I thought you were having a Gollum moment there: *Gollum voice* The box will kills us if wes opens it, its will."  
> sinsrfun10: "The list should have made it obvious that it is Emilia's point of view."   
> Calenlas: "You're right, it should have."  
> "Box, AD box, Greg, AD Greg, Possessed Greg - this is getting confusing. I blame the AD box." "I am expecting to learn that Samantha is some sort of martial arts master, ninja-type person now - it seems to mesh with her personality. Of course, it's not my turn, so I don't get to decide."  
> “Major plot point ignored.”  
> “When one writer basically names all the characters, you know because all the last names are weird.”  
> "Now I'm doing it because I can."

31 October 2020

“So why can’t we destroy the monster?” Emilia asked, confused by Greg’s increased paranoia about the box.

“The box will kill us if we open it. If we open it the monster will eat us. No opening the box!” Greg finished, panting with the effort to communicate this message.

Emilia looked at Samantha and then back at Greg, confused at his insistence. Emilia looked closer at Greg’s eyes. They didn’t look like the soulful brown that she would gaze at when she thought he wasn’t looking. They looked darker, more sinister. ‘Did the monster leave the puzzle box already and infect Greg? Or is this an AD Greg that I don’t even know anymore?’

Emilia made a quick list of questions that she needed to ask Greg to verify his identity:  
1\. When did they meet? They met in freshman year in college in their first class.   
2\. How did Greg propose? Trick question-Em proposed after Greg couldn’t finish the question while on one knee.  
3\. Who is Emilia’s best friend that isn’t Greg? Isabella  
4\. What did Emilia blow up in undergrad? Nothing. _Emilia_ didn’t move to explosions with Isabella until their Master’s work.  
5\. What was Emilia’s first impression of Samantha? She was very enthusiastic for a morning class.  
6\. Who is Emilia’s most annoying student? Samantha (not anymore, but traveling dimensions tends to change student-teacher relationships and impressions.)

Emilia paused in her list making.

This couldn’t be AD Greg. AD Greg and AD Emilia had both come into their house earlier, and Greg was with her the entire time. Which meant…

Sure enough, there was a crack in the box.

Apparently, the original box ate people, but the AD box possesses people instead - and the AD box used Greg’s knowledge of the box to trick Emilia and Samantha.

“Hey Professor Dlaun,” Samantha broke Emilia out of her thoughts. “The box is cracked.”

Emilia nodded, “the AD box possesses people.”

Greg - Possessed Greg really - looked at the two for a moment and began to run. Emilia felt a hot, tingling sensation that she was finally able to identify as the mark’s power activating, and she tried hard to focus on the AD box rather than Greg. Above all, she didn’t want to hurt Greg, and, since Possessed Greg had been protective over the AD box, it followed that the AD box was it’s core anyway.

Still, her control over the mark wasn’t great. If Greg kept moving about like that - she wasn’t sure she could avoid hitting him.

“Samantha, I need you to stop Greg from running - NOW.” She shouted to her student.

Samantha nodded and took off after Greg and the AD box.

Emilia wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Samantha was some sort of martial arts expert, or maybe even that she had joined a ninja clan after watching her launch herself off the ground, grab a tree branch, and swing herself on top of Possessed Greg.

As the two crashed to the ground, Possessed Greg lost his grip on the box, and it skidded about a foot away. Before Possessed Greg had time to shove Samantha off and retrieve it, Emilia released the mark’s power. The black tendrils whipped toward the box, and Possessed Greg let out a howl of pain as the box shattered into a million pieces.

After a few moments, Greg mumbled “Samantha, could you please get off of me?”

“Not until I know ya aren’t possessed.” Samantha pulled his head up while remaining in a kneeling position on his back. Emilia rushed over to check his eyes for signs of possession, not wanting Greg stuck in that uncomfortable, and probably painful, position any longer than necessary.

As she was moving toward him, she felt a warm, tingling sensation on her forehead and the black tendrils swarmed out from the mark faster than ever before, surrounding her, Greg, and Samantha rapidly. 

Emilia felt a sense of disorientation and swirling motion, making her want to throw up. The heat on her forehead intensified and the tendrils closed in so tightly that she couldn’t see. It felt like hours passed before the blackness dissipated and the feeling of motion stopped.

“Em?” Emilia heard Greg’s worried voice drift through her ears, and she pushed herself up from the ground. Greg was barely a foot away with Samantha still on his back, but they weren’t in the African forest anymore. They were back in the lab. Not the creepy human transmutation lab. This was the button-that-should-not-have-been-pressed-was-pressed-and-everything-started-shaking-and-we-were-transported-across-dimensions lab.

It would probably need some repairs.

More importantly, Greg was staring at her with worry lines creasing his forehead and those beautiful brown eyes that she loved. 

“You okay, Em?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I get off ‘im now?” Samantha asked, face looking pale and mildly green.

“Yeah, he’s back to normal.” Almost before Emilia finished replying, Samantha jumped off Greg and ran to a nearby trash can that had toppled over, righted it, and wretched.

“I hate dimensional travel.” Samantha groaned.

Greg, meanwhile, got up and almost knocked Em over as he pulled her into a bear hug. “I’m so sorry, Em. I should’ve listened to you.”

“It’s okay. We’re home now.”

“Yeah, I know.” Greg pulled back and pressed a chaste kiss on her forehead. “The mark’s gone.”

Nothing would ever really be normal again, and all three of them probably needed therapy after that excursion, but Em knew they would be okay.

The End.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How we wrapped this up in two-and-a-half pages of writing I'm not entirely sure but yay! We did it!  
> The End was written by 1700 hours on Halloween.


	25. Whole Work-Redacted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this is everything we wrote with the redactions still in place.

**1 October 2020**

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

" _____________ Gregory. _____________ _____________ _____________," Emilia said, glaring at his audacity.

"Emilia, __________________________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________

Emilia _____________ _____________Greg. _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________

_____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________

_____________ ______

_____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ ______

_________

Nothing.

_____________ _____________ ________

“Emilia! __________________

Emilia _____________ _____________

Gregory was about to _____________the room began shaking and sirens blared _____________

“ _____________, Emilia?” Gregory _____________

_____________

Gregory _____________

_____________Emilia asked as she ran out of the lab, _____________

Gregory _____________ Emilia’s _____________

_____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ Emilia heard it-someone yelling the word professor.

_____________ student _____________ 

Emilia _____________ Gregory _____________her student. _____________Emilia _____________ The student, unfortunately, caught up.

“Professor Dlaun! Professor Dlaun! _____________Emilia and Gregory.

Emilia _____________this student somehow always triggered a migraine.

“Samantha. Samantha! _____________Emilia _____________Professor Xoi and I were running away.”

Samantha deflated into her loosely worn zip-up hoodie. _____________

“Samantha, _____________ Emilia _____________ Gregory _____________

Samantha perked up at her favorite professor’s statement _____________ Samantha _____________

Gregory _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________Emilia _____________‘Why do you hate her?’

Emilia _____________ “I don’t _hate_ her. I … I just-just-she rubs me the wrong way, ok?!”

_____________

Emilia glared at Greg. _____________

_____________an explosion followed swiftly by a bright light which engulfed Emilia, Greg, and the ever-so-slightly-less-than-frantic Samantha. An electric pulse ran through Emilia, _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________. Greg and Samantha seemed to have disappeared, _____________ _____________ _____________ ___

_____________ _____________

_____________Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ she slowly opened her eyes and found herself in a dilapidated cabin.

_____________

Emilia groaned. _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________her excitable student.

_____________ _____________ _____________ greeted by a sharp pain in her abdomen. “Where are we?”

“Some cabin - Professor Xoi went to get water from the stream we passed. _____________ _____________ when did you get a tattoo?”

“I don’t have a tattoo.” _____________ since the explosion:

1\. Injury to the abdomen - unconfirmed but likely  
2\. Mysterious tattoo - confirmed but unspecified  
3\. Dilapidated cabin - it looked to be pretty well built at least  
4\. Stream - the closest body of water to the lab should’ve been the ocean… 5 miles away  
5\. Greg doing manual labor - probably due to Samantha’s nagging?  
6\. Samantha - Well, she was always strange…

_____________ _____________Samantha _____________ Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________Samantha _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________Samanthaness of the discourse, Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________

With Samantha _____________Emilia slowly moved around to check the status of her abdomen _____________ _____________ _____________Samantha’s specific instructions to NOT sit up, Emilia _______ _____________ _____________ ________ __________ _____________-

“AAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!” 

______ 

_____________ Greg and Samantha _____________ Greg _____________ _____________ _____________ Samantha _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________. 

Samantha slowly lowered her hot pink buck knife and glared at Emilia. “I told you not to sit up. Abdomen injuries are _the worst_ on healing,” she paused. _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________

Gregory _____________ _____________ _____________ __ did not drop the bucket of water on the floor, but his grip on the bucket seemed to be waning. 

Emilia was in pain and made sure to keep herself prone. Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________t Samantha was saying about how she got her abdomen scarring. The scarred hole in Samantha’s side, because, _of course_ , Samantha was showing off her sister-inflicted bullet wound, looked kinda nice. It didn’t heal horribly as Emilia had seen in pictures of other bullet wounds. Emilia _____________ Samantha _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________Gregory _____________ _______ Samantha _____________. 

Emilia _____ Gregory ___ Samantha’s _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ Emilia whined, “It hurts.” 

Samantha ___ Gregory _____________ _____________ Emilia. _____________ _____________ _____________

Emilia sighed exasperatedly, “Of course not. I am stuck in this hell hole with NO PAIN MEDS WHILST IN PAIN!” 

Gregory ___________ Samantha _____________ “Emilia _____________ _____________

“I couldn’t tell,” Samantha sarcastically whispered back.

**2 October 2020**

“We need to wash the wound” Gregory _____________

_________ Emilia nearly shouted, then winced _____________ _____________”

Gregory and Samantha shared a look and then Samantha pinned Emilia down as Gregory nearly dumped the entire bucket of water on the wound.

Emilia __________pain _____________ _____________ the pain was gone. Replaced by a calming quiet.

“Uh, Emilia.” Greg _______

_____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ _____________ ________

_______

“Your eyes are glowin’” Samantha cut in. “An eerie goldy-yellowy color, and that blood-red tattoo o’ yours is glowing too.”

_____________ _____________Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________ pulsing began in her temple.

At first, the pulsing was pleasant… _____________ _____________ _____________ but as it became stronger, pain pushed its way in as well. _____________screams - _____________ ___________ Emilia _____________ _____________ _____________, Greg, ___ Samantha.

The room had become unbearably hot, and inky black tendrils with eerie red veins writhing around them spread out from Emilia _____________ from her forehead where the heat seemed focused to an almost scalding degree.

Wind began to whip the black and red tendrils about the room with incredible force, and Emilia could swear she saw a flash of silver and pink flash past her head. Nothing made sense. Nothing…

Emilia _________________________________. ________________________ ____________________________ ____________________________________________. 

______________________, _____________Emilia’s_____________. _________________________________ Emilia’s ___________.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________Emilia_______________________________________

___________ Emilia’s ____________________________________________. __________________________ _______________________________________________________. 

“Professor Dlaun! ______________________ Have you seen Professor Xoi? He wasn’t near where I woke up,” ____________________________________________ Emilia.

Emilia ____________________________________________

____________________________________________ “Professor, my name is Samantha LaLri and I am one of your graduate students in your Applied Physics class. I’m here to help you.” _____________-Samantha-_____________ Emilia _______________________________________, you, Professor Xoi, and I ___________________________________________________________________________________________ What do you remember about last night in the cabin?”

Emilia groaned. “__________, my head is pounding and trying to remember hurts,” ___________, calmed by Samantha’s tender tone. 

___________t, Emilia could have sworn there was ___________ - pity? Derision? - ___________ Samantha’s _______________________________________________________ pushed, a lab, and Professor Gregory Xoi.

Emilia couldn’t remember anything. If she tried, a dull aching began in her temple and something in the back of her mind told her not to let it grow, so she stopped trying to remember and settled with whatever this Samantha,___________ told her. ___________ “Gregory” __________________________________________________________________

______________________

Emilia ___________was having trouble understanding _any_ emotions - even her own. ___________

Wrong.

She felt wrong.

___________Samantha - seemed to get more agitated as time passed. Emilia ______________________ felt increasingly worried the lower the sun sank as well. She was pretty sure it had nothing to do with being outside. Although something niggling in the back of her mind told her that probably wasn’t good either.

Samantha___________ Emilia _____________________________________________________________________________ Emilia refused. The ground ______________________ unforgiving, but fine.

Emilia________________________________________________________________________________________Samantha______________________Samantha’s incessant complaints were irritating, Emilia couldn’t find it in herself to care, especially when considering the alternative.

Emilia______________________ mental checklist ________________:

1\. Memory - faulty, missing pieces, but able to form new  
2\. Sitting up - fine and easy. So why is it surprising?  
3\. Standing up - BAD!! Pain and blackness  
4\. Injuries - no physical signs other than temple throbbing and world fading on standing  
5\. Trees - far away  
6\. Water - close  
7\. Shelter - none   
8\. Gregory - source of unknown emotions  
9\. Emotions - not making sense  
10\. Bugs - won’t approach me, but will attack Samantha  
11\. Form of defense - one hot pink buck knife  
12\. Samantha - well, yeah.

Splashing sounds broke through Emilia’s reverie in the twilight. Samantha ________________

They both turned to gaze at the water coming through the tree line. Emilia ________________________________________________________________ A pink and silver glow emanated from the tree line. It hurt Emilia’s eyes to look at it. Emilia ________________ Samantha ________________________________________________________________ 

________________________________________________ moved closer to the clearing that the women were in. In the twilight glow and unnatural glow of the pink and silver, a large shape began to form in the distance. Samantha began to pray, prayers lowly stumbling from her lips. 

The shape came a few feet from the tree line as though it could see the two women on the other bank near the middle of the clearing. Samantha________________________________________________________________

“Professor Xoi?” ________________________________

“No professor here,” the shape growled, echoing through the clearing.

Samantha already had her hot pink buck knife in hand, her knuckles turning white around the handle. 

Samantha ________________ Emilia ________________, “________________________________

________________________________________________________________ Samantha’s ________________. Emilia ________________________________________________________________.

The throbbing came back, and Emilia began to lose focus. ________________________________ Samantha talking to her, but the words faded away________________

“________________________________________________it lunged toward Emilia.

________________Emilia thought she spotted Samantha _________________ _______________________________________________being thrown back into a tree.________________a loud cracking sound, and then Samantha crumpled to the forest floor.

________________ Emilia________________.

“-lia” A voice greeted her ears “Emilia!” Something, no, _someone_ shook her shoulders. She sat up groggily.

________________

_________________________A man’s face ________________It felt _familiar_ , and that _emotion_ was back.

“Gregory?”________________

“Since when do you use my full name?” ________________________________________________________________

Emilia withdrew cautiously. “I - what are you doing?”

“Checking for a fever.” Gregory sighed. “________________________________monster bits - at least I _assume_ that’s what that goop is” - he signalled to a mound of fleshy bits ________________________________ “Samantha is unconscious and it looks like she has a few broken bones, and you - you look perfectly fine on the ground in the center of it all - you know aside from the bloody-looking tattoo that’s not a tattoo on your forehead.”

“___” Emilia didn’t want to think about what the fleshy mound probably was or how it became like that. ________________blacking out and not remembering seemed like a good thing.

“________________ Gregory_______.

“I don’t have a tattoo.” Emilia muttered, the words falling naturally from her lips despite her unsurety at the statement. Why did she feel so adamant about that?

Gregory chuckled lightly. Emilia felt goosebumps.

“________________, we should find some shelter. It looks like storm clouds are gathering. They’re blocking out the stars.” Emilia _____________ __ ______Gregory’s ________________ . ________________, sky was darkening, little twinkling lights getting blotted out and the moon’s light becoming dimmer by the second, blessedly making it difficult to see the fleshy mound.

“You have to carry me.” Gregory panicked at Emilia’s ________________.

“________________________________________________ checking her for wounds, not finding any. 

“When I stand up, my head throbs and I black out.” Emilia ________________________________ a groan drew her attention.

“________________ you’re back, Professor Xoi.” Samantha’s________________.

________________ Gregory ________________ Emilia’s ________________.

________________ go check on her,” Emilia ordered Gregory.

Gregory ________________________________________________________________ Samantha, avoiding any stray monster bits in his way. He knelt down next to Samantha ________________________________________________

“Overall pain level?”

“Nine?”

Pain level here?” as he manipulates the unbroken looking arm.

“OW!” Samantha ________________________________

________________________________________________.

She sobbed her agreement.

“Samantha, ___________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________ I’m afraid moving you will kill you. But I’m also afraid that not moving you will kill you too.” Gregory looked directly into Samantha’s pain-glazed eyes and asked, “What do you want to do?”

When she heard Gregory’s words, something gripped Emilia’s heart.________________________________________________________________________________________________ it made her forehead throb, ________________________________ an inky tendril swept from her toward Samantha and plunged into the young woman’s chest.

Samantha ________________.

“What are you doing?” Gregory ________________ the hot pink buck knife from the ground ________________ Samantha. ________________ Samantha grabbed his wrist.

“Don’t. It - it hurts less now.”

Gregory’s eyes went wide.

The tendril withdrew and Samantha sat up shakily as Gregory handed back her knife.

________________Gregory ________________.

________________ Samantha shrugged. “But I feel WAY better now.” She stood up. “________________ Emilia?”

Samantha and Gregory turned to her, but Emilia ________________________________ When the tendril had entered Samantha’s chest it had felt like something left her own body - energy maybe? ________________________________________________ 

“Emilia!” Gregory’s ________________________________________________________________

________________________________

An irritating buzzing noise was coming from somewhere, but Emilia ________________________________________________.

“lia. —ake— ease! —lia!”________________________________________________________________________________ 

“— on. Y— ve — Emilia!” ________________________________________________________________

As she cracked her eyes open, Gregory’s worried face came into view.________________________________________________. Her hand was warm and it felt like something was surrounding it… something warm and soft. A hand, maybe?

“________________!” Gregory ________________________________, and the worry lines eased a bit. “You’ve been out for three days! Samantha said you just needed time to heal, but I was so worried that you might- that you wouldn’t- well you did, so it doesn’t matter now. How are you feeling?”

Emilia ________________________________ “I think I’m feeling better,”________________________________. “Where are we?”

Samantha’s ________________________________ doorway. “I think we might be in Africa.”

“__________?” Emilia ________________ “Weren’t we in North America before? More specifically weren’t we in the United States before? ________________” Emilia hissed ________________.

“________________” Gregory ________________” 

Samantha ________________________________. “After you blacked out, we began to walk. To get away from the clearing________________.” Samantha ________________________________, “We walked along the river for a day but after our last rest we woke up a few hours walk from this building.”

“________________,” Gregory ________________. 

Emilia ________________. “Do you mean that we were somehow _transported_ in our _sleep_ to _Africa_?” 

“Uh, yeah.” “Yep.” ________________________________________________.

________________Emilia ________________________________________________ Gregory ________________ Samantha.

________________________________.

1\. Africa - she was unclear why she knew this should be the United States, but…  
2\. Transportation or Teleportation - yeah, that shouldn’t be real… right?  
3\. Chains - are we being held captive, arrested, or...?  
4\. The pile of fleshy bits - she still didn’t want to think about what that was  
5\. Samantha - she seemed healthy… why was that odd?

________________________________ it somehow felt normal for everything to be so screwed up that nothing made sense.

Somehow the ankle chains on Samantha and Gregory were long enough to reach the doorway. Emilia’s ankle chain was short and confined her to the bed she was sitting on and the nearby curtained-off toilet. 

“How long have we been _here_? In this building? Chained by an ankle?” Emilia asked.

Samantha came closer to Emilia’s bed. “About two days for the building-”

Gregory ________________ “But almost 12 hours for being chained.” Gregory ________________ Samantha. “ _She_ threatened the owner of the building.” 

“________________ Samantha?”

Samantha________________________________________________________________________________

Both of the professors looked sheepish and Gregory apologized________________________________. It was Samantha’s fault, but Gregory knew that Samantha ________________ the owner basically called her a whore. 

________________ Emilia asked, tugging mindlessly on the chains.

__________

________________”

________________Emilia cut Samantha off, “my chains are loose.”

“What?” Gregory asked, coming close to Emilia________________

An emotion of some kind that Emilia still could not identify welled up in her the moment Gregory came close to her, and she backed away, hitting the wall… 

And leaving a dent in the stone…

**3 October 2020**

“Follow my finger.” Gregory was doing his best to run a complete diagnosis for a concussion. Emilia understood why. She had blacked out after banging her head on the wall hard enough to dent it after all. Apparently super strength does not always come with super durability.

________________ Emilia ________________________________________________________________________________ Emilia thought through a list of strange things happening to her:

1\. Super strength  
2\. Not knowing what she is feeling  
3\. Losing time  
4\. Somehow on a different continent  
5\. Not chained but was in chains…  
6\. Who are these people that she is chained with?  
7\. She has a tattoo?  
8\. Healing powers?  
9\. Samantha - somehow she was also on this list

“Well, you seem to be okay.” Gregory said, ________________________________

________________________________ Samantha spoke up. “________________ ________________________________I’ll go get my precious hot pink buck knife back and then slit the owner’s throat and-”

“No one is slitting anybody’s throat.” Gregory stated. ________________________________________________we can sneak out of here.”

“And get my buck knife.” Samantha added.

Gregory groaned.

Emilia stifled a laugh - she wasn’t sure _why_ she laughed, but she did. Gregory glanced at her, and she thought for a moment she saw a smile on his face, but then it was gone and he was looking serious again.

“Can you do it?”

“I’ll try.” Emilia replied, pulling on the chain around her ankle. 

________________She was free, ________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ Gregory and Samantha’s.

________________she grabbed Gregory’s chain _____________________________ ________________________________________________

________________ Samantha ________________________________________________ ________________________________

Emilia nodded __________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________ the chain snapped off at her ankle. She repeated this for Gregory - who flinched a little ________________ ________________ - and then for Samantha.

Okay, now they just had to find a way to sneak out without anyone seeing them.

__________________________________________________________” Emilia asked.

“____, there were a couple scary looking guys at the entrance to the building…” Samantha noted. “Aside from that there is the owner who took my hot pink buck knife and-”

“Why are you so obsessed with the buck knife?” Gregory asked.

“________________ we need it. And _________” Samantha trailed off, _____________ ________________________________Emilia. “Uh, your tattoo is glowing again.”

“I don’t have a tattoo!”

“Then what is that ink glowing on your forehead?” Samantha ________________ _________

Before Emilia could respond, an inky black tendril shot out of her forehead toward the door, followed quickly by a second one. And then they split and crashed through the stone wall on either side of the door.

There were a couple of screams, and then everything went black.

“I________________

____

____

____

_____

Emilia ________________________________________________Gregory shut down Samantha’s whining. ________________________________

“________________________________ Emilia grumbled.

“Ah, you’re awake.” Gregory was immediately in front of Emilia shining a penlight in her eyes. Emilia f_________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________ 

________________________________Gregory p_____________________________ ________________________________________________

“You’ve only been out a half a day this time.” Samantha piped up as Gregory ________________ “We got my hot pink buck knife back and left the building behind. We entered a nearby forest, found a stream, walked in it for a bit to hide our tracks, found a cave, and set up a temporary camp.”

As Samantha ________________________________, Emilia ________________________________lighting was dim, but it was enough to make out rocky walls. This was probably the cave Samantha ___________smelled musty. 

A small pile of wood rested against one of the walls, close to a fire ________________ ________________________________________________ they couldn’t see the light from the entrance.

“________________ Emilia indicated a large canvas bag off to one side.

“________________provisions we managed to steal ________________ Samantha smiled proudly.

“There’s a few clothes that will hopefully fit, some food that isn’t likely to spoil, a flint fire starter that made setting up camp a lot easier, and a few other things.” Gregory explained.

________________________________________________Africa________________ ________________________________________________________________ p________________________________

It was a good thing that the group could handle a little bit of smoke because it was getting colder as the night went on. The cave had poor ventilation and the smoke wafted through the air, dimming the light in the cave even more.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Emilia was aware of. Oh, and despite the smoke, her temple wasn’t throbbing.

_That_ was definitely a good sign.

**4 October 2020**

_The inky blackness was suffocating. It closed in,_ ________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

“Em- ts -kay.” A man’s voice. _The blackness receded,_ ________________________________________________ 

When Emilia woke up, she couldn’t quite remember what she had dreamed about. She had a strange feeling that she’d heard Gregory talking to her.

When Emilia woke up, she couldn’t quite remember what she had dreamed about. She had a strange feeling that she’d heard Gregory talking to her.

Emilia ________________________________________________ “Emilia, wake up.” She heard as her body was shaken.

“I was already awake. Stop touching me,” Emilia growled, eyes still closed.

________________ Gregory’s voice. ________________ He stopped shaking her, but he kept one hand on her shoulder.

Emilia opened her eyes to look at him. ________________ ________________ ________________ look on his face ________________ In the flickering light of a dying fire________________ worry, anxiety, and something else - something that made her heart beat, though she couldn’t name it.

“You seemed to be having a nightmare.” Gregory spoke softly. “And then that tattoo on your forehead-”

________________ Emilia mumbled.

Gregory________________ ________________ his grip tightening briefly on her shoulder. “Anyway, when I started talking to you and shook you a bit, the mark stopped glowing.” He leaned against the wall of the cave by her head. “Every time that mark glows, something _unnatural_ happens, and then you pass out.”

Emilia nodded, ________________ .

“Do you know how scared I was?”

Emilia was quiet. What could she say to that? ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ Samantha out cold on the other side of the fire. Their few provisions were stashed along the far wall of the cave. ________________ _emotion_ gripped her heart, ________________ ________________ .

“I’m sorry.”

“What?” Gregory asked.

Emilia turned to look at him. “I’m sorry________________ ________________ Samantha ________________ ________________ ” she signalled to her forehead, “________________ ________________ if it weren’t for me-”

“No, stop.” Gregory held up a hand. “________________ if anyone should be apologizing, it’s me. You told me not to push the button.” 

He sighed, and Emilia tried ________________ to recall ________________ , but the thrumming started in her head and she stopped before it could get worse.

“Em,” Gregory began again, “I just wanted to fix things. I _know_ how you got that lab. I thought maybe we could fix it if-” He stopped.

Emilia stared _______not sure what to say. ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ the moment he called her “Em,” she felt something in her chest, the same _emotion_ she’d been feeling around Gregory for sometime now, but-

_Stronger_.

“Anyway, here.” Gregory handed her some bread and dried meat. “You should eat. You’ve missed way too many meals.”

Emilia ________________ ________________ .

“Slow down, Em.” Gregory ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ ”

Emilia ________________ ________________ . She began to eat more slowly.

While she was eating, she heard the sound of shuffling from across the campfire.

“Ah, ya two’re up.” A groggy Samantha greeted. “Good fer ya.”

________________ ________________ Gregory spoke, stoking the fire while he did so. “What’s with that dialect of yours that only shows up when you’re half asleep or freaking out?”

“Eh?” Samantha blearily rubbed her eyes. “That’s ‘cause _he_ said not ta speak that way ‘round people ya wanna impress… or somethin’ like that.” 

_________ Emilia ____________ 

Samantha nodded, still half asleep. “Yeah - _him_. The guy who gave me this.” She held up the hot pink buck knife. Then her eyes went wide and she put a hand over her mouth.

“Awake now?” Gregory asked.

Samantha nodded, her hand still over her mouth.

Emilia ________________ ________________ Samantha ________________ ________________ Samantha t________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ .

“Breakfast?” Gregory ________________ ________________ ________________ .

“Mef.” Samantha nodded, still covering her mouth. Emilia guessed “mef” probably meant “yes.” 

________________ Samantha________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ Emilia________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ ________________ Emilia ________________ ________________ Samantha ________________ Samanthaness - a dash of stubbornness, a squeeze of curiosity, a pinch of frustration, and a screw loose.

________________ the group ________________ ________________ attempted to develop a plan. First, Emilia summarized what they knew:

“1. The Not Tattoo - it occasionally glows, supernatural things happen, and I pass out  
2\. Location - a cave in a forest near a stream somewhere in Africa not far from a building  
3\. Enemies - the owner of the building, his subordinates, and probably who- or whatever brought us to Africa  
4\. Help - probably doesn’t even know we need it  
5\. Supplies - enough provisions to last about a week, maybe two if we stretch them, a fire started (flint), a change of clothes, a hot pink buck knife, a few miscellaneous items  
6\. Health - aside from memory loss and occasional throbbing in the temple that seems to be caused by or at least related to the not tattoo, I appear to be healthy. Samantha is healthy. Gregory is healthy.   
7\. Samantha - still Samantha”

________________ ________________ 

________________ ______________

____

**5 October 2020**

_Four years ago….or how Emilia got her lab:_

_Emilia _____________________________________ ______________________ ______________________________________

_Her best friend Greg and his girlfriend, Samantha, joined Emilia’s booth at the diner near the college. Samantha was always envious of the deep friendship that Greg and Emilia________________ Greg________________________________ Emilia ________________________________________________________________________________._

_“Hey Em, did you hear?” Greg asked, settling himself in the pink-colored booth._

__________________________________________________

__________________________________

_Emilia________________________________________________________________________________ She leaned over the table close to Greg and hissed, “Whose lab?”_

_Greg gulps but calmly answers the questions. “I don’t know what or how. The why and the lab answer the same question. Dr. Lenox was running an experiment. I heard someone needed to push a button on the control board. Dr. Lenox is hospitalized with four lab assistants. Lab gossip is that he refuses to step into that lab ever again.”_

_________________________________________________ Samantha asked, cutting into the conversation._

_Greg took his girlfriend’s hand and looked into her eyes. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Dr. Lenox has been in his lab for six years-the longest time someone has been in that lab ever. Everyone else has been in the labs for less than two years.________________Em ________________________________________________ Emilia________________._

_Emilia nodded and gestured for him to continue his explanation. The less she spoke to Samantha the better._

_____________ Em _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________ Samantha paused, “But why don’t you want your own lab?”_

_Greg laughed. “I’m a biologist. I don’t need a whole lab to myself. ________________________________Emilia _________________

_________________________________________________Emilia _________________________________________________

_________________________________Greggy?” Samantha _________________________________

____Samantha. Em’s_________________

_________________ Greggy-” Emilia gagged on the nickname. “________________________________________________ I wonder how the accident happened in Lenox’s lab.”_

End Flashback

Gregory woke with a start. He wasn’t sure when he fell asleep, but he did _not_ enjoy dreaming about his ex - and he was _really_ glad Em never called him ‘Greggy.’ ________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________

________________Dr. Lenox and his lab assistants had supposedly spent an inordinately long time in the lab without contacting anyone just before being hospitalized - so long in fact that one of the lab assistants who was a student still living with his parents had been reported missing. ________________________________________________ 

__________________________________________________________________________

________________________________

“Emilia,” Gregory turned to the woman he loved, careful not to use his nickname for her now that Samantha was up - they had agreed a long time ago not to use pet names in front of students (though Em often called him ‘Greg’ anyway, claiming it was such a common name that no one would notice). 

He hesitated before continuing. Em had lost her memories, and it seemed she didn’t want to ________________________________________________but he couldn’t remember all the details about Dr. Lenox’s group, ________________________________

________Em ________________________________________________________________

Gregory sighed. “Yeah, listen, I need you to think… no, I want to know if you remember Dr. Lenox.”

Emilia ________________________________ Gregory ________________________________ 

______Emilia cut herself short, clutching her head tightly as a pained groan escaped her. The mark (definitely not a tattoo - Em would never willingly get one after seeing what happened to her father) started glowing again.

“Em, ________________ Gregory grabbed hold of her shoulders. He wanted desperately to pull her into a bear hug _________________________

Emilia ________________________________ glowing intensified.

“Emilia, ________________________________________________________________ Gregory really wished he remembered the calming techniques his therapist had taught him when he was struggling with panic attacks in high school. ________________________________________________

________ Gregory ________________________________ Emilia’s ______

________________________________________________________________________________________________Look at me Emilia. Focus on me.”

After a few more minutes ________________Emilia ____________________________________________her breathing started to even out, and the pained creases smoothed away. The mark also faded back to its dormant state. Emilia ________________leaning against Gregory’s chest ______ fell into an exhausted sleep.

“So, I’ll go get some water.” Samantha’s voice startled Gregory. ________________ _________

________________Take your buck knife.”

“I wouldn’t go anywhere without it.”

Samantha ____________________________She carried a stolen canteen that ________________________________________________ Because while the water was close, it was still tricky to get to it.

She could hear the water moving and finally made it to a place where she was able to fill the canteen.________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ There was a huge blowup in the quad a couple of years before Samantha transferred in that resulted in Professor Xoi breaking up with his girlfriend. There were a few jokes about her getting none, ___ Samantha ________________ 

Samantha________________________________ Professor Dlaun ________________________________________________________________________________ Professor Xoi. 

“________________, Professor Dlaun?” Samantha asked, looking in the bag for food to pass around. 

“________________, Samantha.” Professor Dlaun ________________. 

“________________,” Samantha _______, not looking up.

“Did you see anyone while you were out there?” Professor Xoi cut in.

Samantha shook her head. “Nah.” Then she thought better of her speech. “I mean, no. There was no one out there.”

From the corner of her eye, Samantha caught sight of Professor Dlaun stifling a laugh. 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“So do we have a plan for how to get out of Africa and back to the US?” Samantha ________________________________________________Emilia l________________________________________________________________ Samantha ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 

“I’ve been thinking about that.” Gregory boiled some of the water Samantha had brought and prepared some of the provisions for a meal as he answered. “I think I have an idea.”

“Great! So what’s yer plan?” Samantha ________________________________________________________________________________t Professor Dlaun - __ she was more than a little excited.

**6 October 2020**

No writing was done today because sinsrfun10’s computer glitched and wasn’t done reloaded the operating system until roughly 2300 hours. It wasn’t ready for anything with her writing software until 2200 hours on 7 October 2020. It was also sinsrfun10’s turn to write. It was not a fun 48 hours for sinsrfun10.

**7 October 2020**

“________________” Professor Xoi________________________________Professor Dlaun. “It’s to somehow get the tattoo to transport us back.”

“You want to-” 

“THE STUPID TATTOO THAT GOT US STUCK HER IN DA FIRS’ PLACE?! THAT’S YER PLAN?” Samantha _______________________________________.

Professor Xoi held up his hands and began to placate the angry armed young woman. “Samantha, ________________________________________________________________________________________________”

Samantha________________________________ Professor Dlaun. “What do ya think prof?” Samantha’s _____________________________________.

Professor Dlaun looked like she was in deep thought. “I think-I think his hypothesis is right and wrong.” ________________ Samantha ____ Professor Xoi. “I think the tattoo,” she winces, briefly touching her forehead, “transported us here. But it brought us here for a _reason_. We just have no idea as to the reason why it brought us here.” 

**8 October 2020**

________________Emilia.” Gregory spoke solemnly. “But, can we risk trying to find out?”

Emilia ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“But I can’t control the tattoo.” ________________________________________________________________________________“And besides, there’s no guarantee that it _will_ take us back until we do whatever we were sent here to do.”

________________ Gregory reluctantly agreed. “Agh! Why didn’t I go talk to Dr. Lenox with you that time! Then we might know more about what happened to him and we might have a clue about how to get back now.”

________________ Emilia’s ____. “If I could remember…”

“No. ________________” Gregory cut her off. “You’ve tried, and it just made you suffer, so don’t go there.”

“So we ‘ave no plan again?” Samantha did not look happy. ________________________________________________.

“Samantha, seriously, what is going on with your accent?” Emilia inquired.

Samantha looked upset, caught off guard by Emilia’s question. 

“I was just curious, you don’t have to answer me,” Emilia continued, noticing Samantha’s reaction. Gregory nodded, backing up Emilia’s statement.

Samantha________________t Emilia’s ________________ Gregory’s ________________. “I’ll tell you, but I have to skip over some parts because of...reasons.” Samantha said, forcing her accent under control. 

“It started when I was young. My parents were okay, but my grandfather who lived with us had strict rules on how us young’uns presented ourselves to outside society. I may have an accent when I’m upset or plain mad but I can present myself as an educated woman no different than anyone in higher social status.” Samantha held herself up a little higher as she continued her story.

“Grandfather brought in outside help to train us into society ladies. _That_ man was…” Samantha trailed off. “The best thing I learned from _him_ was how to hide a knife in various outfits and still be able to use it easily.” 

“My great-uncle taught us how to use the knife outdoors and not in self-defense. He helped us learn how to survive in the backwoods. My siblings and I were lucky to have two great men in our lives, Grandfather and Great-Uncle.” Samantha’s gaze went unfocused as she murmured, “I miss them.”

**9 October 2020**

Emilia’s heart twinged, and -________________ - so did Gregory’s.

________________ Samantha plastered on a smile. She looked like her perky self, but Emilia thought that maybe not all that perkiness was real. “________________________________________________________________________________________________”

“Well,” Gregory stated calmly, “first, you don’t need to ‘talk like a lady’ to impress us, Samantha. Just be yourself. Second, since we don’t have any clues, maybe we try using the tattoo once and if it fails miserably then we don’t do it again and start trying to figure out why we’re here.”

Emilia nodded. “I________________.” She paused. “And can we _please_ start calling it a mark instead of a tattoo?”

**10 October 2020**

… maybe using the mark wasn’t the best plan.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________, the group had decided to have Emilia try thinking really hard about going home. ________________Emilia didn’t _remember_ ____home ________________________________________________________________________________ they ultimately decided that she should try to instinctively think of home combined with the general descriptions that Gregory and Samantha provided her. ________________________________.

This was definitely NOT home. Emilia ________________________________Gregory and Samantha’s ________________.

Emilia ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________this was not the beautiful island chain of Hawaii.________________________________

They were now standing in a veeeeeery cold place with lots of snow surrounded by an evergreen forest. The clothes that were perfect for Africa, if a little hot, were now inadequate for the lost trio. They stood in shock for what felt like an eternity but was more like five minutes. 

Emilia ___ Samantha ________________. 

As Samantha spoke, tremors wreaked havoc on her body. “We need shelter. We need it now.” Samantha’s voice was urgent and forceful.

Emilia ___ Gregory l________________________________________________________________________________. 

Samantha spoke again, “If we move to the trees and dig into the snow next to one, we can build a little hibernation cave. Luckily the bag made it here so it’s possible for us to build a fire and eat a little bit. That’ll make surviving a tinsy bit easier.”

Emilia ___ Gregory ________________ Samantha said. ________________ over to the closest tree. Samantha had kept walking past them to a tree that was a little smaller around than the one that Emilia and Gregory picked. 

“Why this one?” Gregory asked. 

“Because this one is less likely to catch on fire and burn us,” was Samantha’s tense reply.

Samantha dropped the bag on the ground and began to rifle through it. “I coulda swore I saw a…” she muttered. “I was right!” She yelled triumphantly, holding a folded thing in the air. “A collapsible shovel. That’ll make digging a shelter and a fire hole easier on us.”

Samantha unfolded the shovel ________________ Gregory ________________________________ Samantha over to Emilia to share body heat. Gregory began to dig.

____ Gregory was digging, Emilia thought up a list of pros and cons about whether or not she should try using the mark again.

________________________________________________  
________________________________  
________________________________________________________________  
________________________________  
5\. ___Gregory ________________________________  
6\. ____Samantha ________________

Before she could truly make up her mind, Emilia felt something happening. Black tendrils snaked out from her forehead and plunged into the snow where Gregory was digging. Emilia ________________________________________________________________

“Em- -ake” someone shook her violently. “Y- -n’t -eep -ow.” Her mind felt sluggish, and she was cold. “EMILIA!” Emilia shot up when Gregory shouted in her ear.

“What was that for?!”

“You can’t sleep right now.” Gregory had an apologetic look on his face. “This hole, cave, thing is a lot better than outside in the snow, but it’s still really cold, and we don’t have enough wood for a fire yet.”

With that remark, Emilia’s mark proceeded to ________________, ________________ new black tendrils towards the nearby trees. Emilia passed out.

Samantha ________________Emilia ____ Emilia ________________

“Professor Xoi, she’s awake!”

It felt warm and Emilia could not see the sky above her. 

“________________”

“The cave the mark helped us dig,” Gregory replied, making his way from the fire that Emilia just noticed. 

“________________”

“It isn’t as big as the cabin but not as small as the room we were locked in in Africa either,” Samantha replied. “That mark is as handy as Deux Ex Machina in books. Resolves problems but makes twenty more in the process.”

Gregory nodded before adding “Yeah, ________________While we do have a fire and shelter, we only have a little food and we can’t exactly go foraging or hunting the way we’re dressed right now.”

________________________________Gregory and Samantha gave Emilia the determination to try using the mark again. ______________________________________________________ ____ _ _ ____________________________________

“Can you describe home again?” ________________.

Gregory looked at her worriedly. “Em,” he paused and glanced at Samantha, “er Emilia, ________________________________________________________________________________not right after you woke up after the second time you passed out in an hour.”

________________ Samantha cut in. “________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________”

Emilia sighed but nodded her assent. “________________v”

Gregory studied Em’s face for a moment. She was clearly frustrated with this situation, and he guessed she felt at least partly responsible for this situation even though it wasn’t her fault at all. If anyone was to blame, it was him. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________Em ________________________________________________________________________________t he really didn’t want her to end up killing herself by using it too frequently and draining out all of her energy. 

If he had calculated correctly, the rations they had left should still last a couple days. Samantha seemed to know a bit about survival in the outdoors - ________________________________________________ - so she might know how to make some simple traps that they could use to catch small game, assuming there was small game to catch. They might also be able to forage nuts of some kind.

The real problem was clothing. Even if they doubled up with what they were currently wearing and the spare sets they had managed to steal while they were in Africa, it wouldn't be anywhere near enough to keep them warm in the extreme cold. They might be able to turn the bag into a cloak of some kind… there was a basic sewing kit in it. That would at least help a little bit, but it might not be enough, and it would only help one of them.

**11 October 2020**

When Professor Xoi told her his idea to forage for nuts or hunt small game, Samantha almost laughed ________________________________

“________________________________ it's winter. Any small game around will be hibernatin’ and those trees out there,” Samantha ________________________________ are not nut-producin’ trees. They produce pine cones which’ll be handy in a pinch, but not nuts. Frankly, I’m more afraid of the hibernatin’ animals ________________”

Professor Xoi sighed. “________________.” He glanced at Professor Dlaun who was currently napping. ________________________________

Samantha t________________ “________________nope. I don’t like usin’ that mark thingy, but we ain’t got what we need ta live more ‘n a day or two ‘ere.”

Professor Xoi sighed again. “________________________________it’s my fault we’re here, yet she’s the one who…” ________________________________

“________________,” Samantha said, ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.”

Professor Xoi was silent for a moment. “It’s a bit of a long story.”

For the next hour or so while Professor Dlaun was still sleeping, Professor Xoi told Samantha the most Sci-fi sounding story she had ever heard that she couldn’t do anything but believe after the past several days. The story had some gaps - especially relating to what the Dr. Lenox guy who used to own the lab knew. Apparently, Professor Dlaun had talked to him in the hospital once just before she took over the lab and came away from the meeting saying the old man was delirious.

When Professor Dlaun started moaning and scrunching her face up like she was having a nightmare, Professor Xoi immediately went to her and talked gently to her sleeping form. Samantha heard him call her “Em” again. Samantha would have taken the opportunity to make herself scarce if it weren’t ultra-freezing, frost forming on hot pink buck knife cold outside. 

Honestly, she had guessed a long time ago that Professor Dlaun had a boyfriend. Samantha had overheard her on the phone planning an outing that sounded suspiciously like a date a few times. ________________ Professor Xoi ________________Professor Dlaun ________________Professor Dlaun’s missing memory, she still reacted to Professor Xoi in little ways - like now. As Professor Xoi talked to her, the creases in her forehead eased, and her moaning stopped. ________________

“Sooo… how long have you been datin’?” Samantha asked when Professor Xoi finished soothing Professor Dlaun. 

He looked startled. “Um-uh. We aren’t dating. We are really good friends,” he stammered out. “ _Why_ does everyone think we’re dating?” He muttered.

“‘________________________________________________________________________________________________” Samantha told him matter of factly.

“Emilia was _not_ the downfall of my last relationship. My last relationship failed because she thought she could poach hours in the bio lab from me.”

“Um, I meant the screamin’ end relationship in the quad. Everyone knows _that_ story. It’s a legend on campus.”

The startled look came back to Professor Xoi’s face. “ _Everyone_ blames _Emilia_ for that?” 

Samantha nodded. 

“Shit. Sorry, shouldn’t curse around students. But, crap. _I_ was the reason that relationship failed. I refused to give up a decade-long friendship because of a woman that wanted to be my sole focus. Science is my sole focus and Emilia gets that because she’s the same way.” Professor Xoi sat back on his heels. “So everyone blames Emilia and not science for my relationships failing?”

Samantha nodded again. “So the screamin’ match in tha quad that coined the phrase ‘getting none’ on campus was about _science_ and not Professor Dlaun? Not that it’s my business or anythin’ but I’m curious.”

Professor Xoi nodded. “ _She_ blamed all of the downfalls of our relationship on Emilia and not her trying to grasp my attention from the labs. Most people in the humanities don’t understand how crucial lab time _is_ and that many wanting tenure are willing to do severe harm to others in line. I _know_ that if Dr. Lenox’s lab didn’t come up for another year that Emilia had _plans_ to ensure another lab did become free. She likes Dr. Lenox, or did anyway.”

Samantha was sure that she had a puzzled look on her face.

Professor Xoi answered her unasked question of why. “Dr. Lenox sponsored her doctoral work. Emilia was devastated about his delusional state in the hospital. Maybe he wasn’t delirious? Maybe he was in shock?”

“Yeah, or maybe he wasn’t either. What sounded like delusions might ‘ave been real. I mean, look at Professor Dlaun right now. ________________________________________________________________________________”

“________________” Professor Xoi nodded. “________________________________________________“Em” he cleared his throat “Emilia never really elaborated on what Dr. Lenox’s ‘delusions’ were - even to me.”

Samantha gave the professor a look. “Ya know, if I’m allowed ta ‘be me’ an’ speak how I want ‘round you and Professor Dlaun, ya can call her ‘Em’ in front of me.”

A few hours later, Professor Dlaun woke up and Professor Xoi explained their current situation and his and Samantha’s thoughts on using the tat- mark.

“I agree. I’ll have to use it.”

“Don’t push yourself, Em.” Professor Xoi passed Professor Dlaun some rations after giving Samantha her share. “Rest for a little longer. If we have to take a risk with the mark, we’re going to make the risk as small as possible. I don’t- we don’t want to see you get hurt or kill yourself from overexertion.

“I’m okay.” Professor Dlaun grimaced at the taste of the rations. “I’ll try when I finish eating. Can you two describe what home is like again?”

“Home is…” Samantha began. “The University of Hawaii at Mānoa. It is on the island of Honolulu in the island chain of Hawaii. It is roughly two kilometers east of the Pacific Ocean. The front of campus has a reddish-brown low wall with the words University of Hawaii Mānoa in black capitalized letters. There is a flowerbed directly behind the wall with two white flag poles to the left of the letters. About twenty feet back from the flowerbed is a building. It has covered hallways held up by pillars. The front pillars are five across and behind and to the right of the letters. The part of the building behind the flagpoles is shorter than the covered hallways and has twenty by four small box windows. There are trees all around and between the flowerbed and the building is grass. The trees are different from the trees here and in Africa. There are palm trees and the other trees don’t look like the trees here. They are taller and a brighter green than these.” 

“I think I got it,” Professor Dlaun said after Samantha’s deluge of information. 

“How did you remember all that?” Professor Xoi whispered into Samantha’s ear.

“I just pictured the memory I had of my first day on campus,” Samantha shrugged. “It was a new life for me so I made sure to make my first memory of this life stick.”

Professor Dlaun ________________________________________________________________________________________________ the mark on her forehead started glowing, and everything went dark as a swirling, nauseating sense of falling and being shunted around in a whirlpool at the same time enveloped Samantha and the two professors.

“Em...ake up...ow..re you?”

The first thing Emilia was aware of was Gregory’s voice. The next thing she was aware of was his concerned face and a calming breeze washing over her skin.

“Did it work?”

“Well, there are palm trees.” When Gregory smiled a lopsided grin, Emilia felt her heart skip a beat.

“Yeah, palm trees.” Samantha cut into the conversation. “And mosquitos. And water. But that doesn’t make it Hawaii.”

“So where are we?” Emilia wasn’t sure how to read Samantha’s expression. It felt tense but also strangely calm.

“The Bayou.” 

“Uh…”

“The Louisiana Bayou.”

“Oh.” Emilia didn’t know how to react. That was...definitely unexpected. “Um, how exactly do you know that we are in the Louisiana Bayou?” 

“I…. grew up around here.”

That answer came from Gregory. This felt unexpected to Emilia and she wasn’t sure why it was unexpected from him.

“Do you have an accent too, Professor Xoi?” Samantha asked.

Gregory’s face seemed to go blank. “No,” he replied tersely. “We need to get away from the water and find a town. Someway to get us back to Hawaii without using the mark to travel. I think we can all agree that that is a bad idea.”

Samantha nodded. “________________________________.”

“Alligator.” Gregory corrected. “There aren’t crocodiles in the Bayou. And besides, it’s winter, so as long as none of them are starved, they should be hibernating right now.”

“________________.” Samantha replied. “________________________________________________?”

While Gregory was busy explaining to Samantha that just because he grew up in the Bayou it doesn’t mean he knew where in the Bayou they were right now, Emilia started absentmindedly fingering the necklace she was wearing.

Wait. Had she been wearing this the whole time?

Emilia looked down at the necklace and realized it was, in fact, a very beautiful diamond ring on a simple chain.

“Hey, what’s that?” Samantha asked, coming to look. Her eyes widened, and she looked back at Gregory. “________________________________________________

Gregory’s face went red. He didn’t look straight at either of them when he replied. “I proposed last week.”

Samantha started saying something, but Emilia couldn’t clearly make out the words. Her mind felt heavy, and her temple started throbbing. Images and sounds started running through her mind in a dizzying swirl. At first, they were blurry sights and muffled sounds, but they started sharpening, and Emilia began to realize they were memories.

She was alone when a hand landed on her shoulder and Gregory’s face popped into her field of vision with a lopsided grin. Then they were in a lab - her lab - chatting and eating lunch. She was curled up on the couch crying her eyes out and then he was there, arms around her, making her feel like things would be okay. So many small moments, and some longer. There were arguments, but there were also apologies. Tension never lasted. They were friends, and they were more than that too.

And then there he was, awkwardly stumbling over words and face blushing madly while she held a ring that had fallen out of his lab coat’s pocket. Frozen for a moment, then she hugged him, nearly knocking him off his feet, as she mumbled yes over and over.

She belonged here. Home wasn’t her lab. It wasn’t the school. It wasn’t an apartment or a house. _Home_ was by his side, in his arms.

Emilia felt energy radiating from her, but it wasn’t draining her this time. She felt dizzy, but only for a moment. Then her vision cleared.

“Where-“ Emilia saw Samantha’s eyes bug out of her head “we didn’t just break inta somebody’s house, right?”

The trio stood in a cozy living room with multiple bookcases crammed along the wall, a loveseat and a couch nestled around a short coffee table, and a big bay window with a view of the ocean.

“No.” Emilia felt confident for the first time in a while. “We’re home.”

“Home? Whose home?” Samantha demanded.

“Ours.” Emilia and Greg responded simultaneously.

“Soooo, how close to the university are we?”

“It’s a five-minute drive,” Greg answered. “But I think both of our cars are on campus so we’ll have to hitch a ride on the bus.”

“I always lived in the dorms and didn’t leave campus much. How much is the bus?”

“I have no idea. I always drove.”

Emilia thought for a moment. “I think my purse is still in the lab - assuming it wasn’t destroyed in the explosion.”

“Same here.” Samantha said, then froze. “________________________________

Emilia nodded. “It’s not all back, but a lot of it is - the important parts anyway.” She glanced at Greg.

Samantha ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“________________________________” Greg responded defensively. “Besides, it seemed to hurt her when she tried to remember things, so…”

Emilia smiled. That was just like Greg. “________________Greg, ________________________________From what I recall, neither of us really keep cash lying around aside from your wallet and my purse which is potentially in little bits right now.”

Greg shook his head. “I lost it before I found you and Samantha back when we were split up. And considering the swim I took in the river while I was trying to find you, I don’t think the cash in it would be usable even if it were here.”

“Then I guess we’re walking.” Emilia stated. “It’s only about a half-hour by foot, so it should seem pretty easy compared to the walking you’ve both done over the past several days.” She paused. “The only thing is, what do we do when we get to the University?”

They all stared at each other for a moment before Greg spoke up. “Maybe before we head back to the lab we should have a proper meal and talk about our options.” He paused for a moment. “Em, do you remember your conversation with Dr. Lenox?”

**12 October 2020**

Emilia didn’t look puzzled by the question. “I do remember Dr. Lenox. His delusion was that his entire team was transported to another dimension by marks on every third person.”

“________________” Samantha asked, pointing at Emilia’s forehead.

Emilia nodded. “But none of them had the marks when they got back. He said one day after they had ‘finished their task’ that the marks just disappeared in a wave of bright light and they were all transported back to the lab.”

“Task?” Greg asked.

Emilia shook her head. “He never specified. In fact, when I asked him about it, he vehemently refused to say anymore other than ‘no one should ever know what we went through - what we had to do.’ ________________________________

________________Greg replied.

“_____,” Samantha cut in, “you mean you’re still gonna have that mark thingy and the creepy powers until we go back ta Africa an’ deal with whatever wacky task was set up for us?”

“Probably, yes.” Emilia replied.

________________________________________________

After a minute, Greg spoke up. “________________________________.” He looked at Emilia. “You said Dr. Lenox told you they were sent to ‘another dimension.’ So, why were we sent to Africa, a place in _our dimension_?”

“________________” Samantha waved her hands. “I know this is all a Sci-fi scenario, but are we really sayin’ there are other dimensions?”

“Yes.” Emilia and Greg replied in unison.

“In fact, Dr. Lenox was studying the possibility of alternate dimensions, parallel timelines, and contusions in the space-time continuum.” Emilia continued. “The machine in the lab was supposed to be the product of his research. Though, before the accident, he was always concerned about it, saying there were lots of things that needed tweaking and gaps in the research that needed filled in. After the accident…” she paused, took a deep breath, and resumed. “After the accident he said it should be scrapped entirely. I thought it was… I had decided to follow up on his research, to show him that it was… I didn’t want to see him give up. It was - hard to see him like that.”

Greg placed a hand on her shoulder.________________________________“That’s why I pushed the button. I saw you day after day pushing yourself to try and finish his research, and I thought - you had been stuck on one small thing for weeks. I thought if we did a test run then maybe…”

“I’ll just go in the other room while you two talk this out.” Samantha cut in. “This way?” She asked, pointing at a simple wooden door a few feet behind the couch.

Emilia nodded. “Thanks Samantha. That leads to the hall. The third door on the right is a guest room. You’re welcome to it.”

“Actually,” Greg added, “why don’t we make that your room for now - ________________________________________________”

“________________.” Emilia agreed. “________________________________”

Samantha stared at the two professors for a moment. “Right.” She gave a half-laugh. “And I thought I was the weird one here.” She paused a moment and shook her head. “Then again, I take that back. The moment that mark appeared I stopped bein’ the weird one.”

**13 October 2020**

Samantha had to admit, the Professors had nice taste. The guest room was decorated in a cozy style and provided two large, double-wide bookshelves, a writing desk with space for a laptop (and a surge-protected power strip to plug in) and a comfortable rolling chair, a big comfy chair by the window - perfect for curling up with a book - a queen size bed with sheets and a light blanket (additional blankets and a comforter were stored on the top shelf in the closet), a dresser, and some nature-themed wall art. The colors were not too drab nor too exaggerated, and the rich wood floor had soft rugs between the bed, dresser, and desk.

**14 October 2020**

As Samantha left the room, Greg and Emilia continued talking about why he thought it was a great idea to push a button marked “Do NOT Push.”

**15 October 2020**

**16 October 2020**

________________________________Emilia and Greg had come to the conclusion that they were both at fault - Greg for pushing the button without first discussing it with Emilia and Emilia for not talking to Greg before it came to that point when she was so stressed out - and both not at fault: neither could have predicted this. 

________________the first order of business was to determine if they were _actually_ back. There was, in their opinions, a high probability that - if they had been sent to an alternate dimension as had happened to Dr. Lenox - they could not force the mark to send them back without completing their “task” - ________________especially considering that Emilia still had the mark. But, they wouldn’t tell Samantha until they were sure this was actually a different dimension. The possibility seemed to shake her up quite a bit, and it was important for all of them to be as calm as possible.

**17 October 2020**

There were a few possible ways they could potentially figure out if this was a different dimension, but proving it wasn’t a different dimension would be an entirely different matter. If the two dimensions were almost identical, then…

Well, they would cross that bridge when they came to it. While Samantha was occupied exploring her new guest room, Emilia and Greg set to work testing their dimension. While they didn’t have their laptops - they were likely still at the campus if they had survived the explosion - they did have a home desktop computer. They didn’t use it much, but they had both agreed that it was good to have one at least as a backup in case one or both of their laptops went on the fritz. Emilia’s job was to log into her email account and check for anything out of the ordinary before searching online news about the explosion or anything else related to the university. Meanwhile, Greg was going to go channel surfing on the living room television set, especially focusing on newscasts, but also looking for other potential discrepancies.

“We’ve time-traveled or we’re in a dimension that runs slower than ours,” Emilia said, from the already booted computer. 

“Why?” Greg stopped, turning to look at Emilia. 

“Look at the date and time.”

“We’re THREE days before the explosion!” He exploded, looking to Emilia for more physics-based answers.

Emilia got a horrified look on her face. “What if this is our dimension and we run into our past selves?”

Greg looked equally horrified. 

Another terrible thought occurred to Emilia. “What if we took our dimensional analogues’ places in this dimension?” She whispered lowly, “What if every jump we made swapped our places for our analogues’?” A long pause happened as Emilia tried to formulate the horror if this happened. “We’ve jumped four times. What if we are four infinite dimensions away from our home dimension? How will we get home?”

Greg was silent.

“Greg,” Emilia began again after she paused to compose herself, “what do we tell Samantha?”

About that time, there was a rustling sound outside the front door.  
“Em, are you going to be at the lab again tomorrow?” Greg’s voice drifted through the door accompanied by the sound of a key turning in the lock.

Greg and Emilia looked at each other. 

This was bad.

“Turn off the computer. I’ll put the remote back…” Greg whisper-shouted at Emilia as the two rushed to beat the opening of the door.

“Yes,” Emilia’s voice drifted through the solid wood, and the door creaked open. “I have to run some more tests on the monkeys.”

Wait.

_Monkeys?_

Greg looked at Emilia. Emilia looked at Greg. Neither one of them had ever done research on _monkeys_.

Not having the time to deal with this now, Emilia and Greg rushed to put everything back in order.

“Samantha!” Greg whisper-shouted as they finished “She’s still in the guest room!”

The two dashed for the guest room, hoping that it still was a guest room, and barely closed the door as they heard the front door creak open. Greg clapped a hand on a startled Samantha’s mouth.

**18 October 2020**

Samantha briefly attempted to get out of his hold but his harsh whisper made her stop. 

“Be quiet. We’re in a different dimension and our analogues are _here_.”

Samantha nodded to Emilia’s relief and Greg continued.

“We have to get out of here.”

Emilia gestured to the guest room window which opened up a few feet off the ground, but was easily accessible to climb out of. The only problem with the window was that it faced the street. _Anyone_ could see them climbing out and if someone was watching, they would have seen doubles walking in the house in different clothes and the woman without a tattoo on her forehead. 

________________ Samantha________________ Emilia ________________Samantha ________________________________ Greg ______ Emilia ________________________________________________ Emilia also climbed out the window successfully but had the sudden urge to make a new list of things the group knew.

1\. They were in a different dimension  
2\. Emilia did an experiment with monkeys in this dimension  
3\. The date in this dimension is at least six days total ahead of the group’s lived time  
4\. She and Greg are engaged  
5\. Greg blew up Emilia’s lab due to stress  
6\. Emilia healed Samantha  
7\. Samantha?

________________________________Where was the Samantha of this dimension? 

If Emilia was doing experiments on monkeys in this dimension, it seemed unlikely that Samantha would still be her student - well the Samantha from her original dimension wasn’t likely to work with her in this dimension if she was doing monkey experiments, but then Emilia didn’t like the idea of herself doing experiments with monkeys, so maybe this dimension’s Samantha was working with this dimension’s Emilia.

Okay, there had to be a better and less clunky way to refer to this dimension’s people. AD? For Alternate Dimension?

**19 October 2020**

Samantha was freaking out. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___ Samantha ________________. She heard the two people inside the house. ________________ ethical experimentation. The woman was loudly telling the man off about messing with her experiments and the man kept retorting back about how “her experiments weren’t going anywhere useful anyway.” Samantha saw both of her professors flinch on that line though. 

Samantha carefully peeled Professor Xoi’s hand off her face. “I________________________________________________why did we have to leave a nice beautiful bed behind?”

“They’re us,” Professor Dlaun muttered. “They’re us, but different. _That_ Emilia is a biologist, I think. The yelling about monkey experiments shows that to us. We don’t know what specialty AD Greg has, but it is still probably Bio based on their argument.”

“AD?” Samantha inquired.

“Alternate Dimension.”

“Oh.” Samantha looked around at their environment. “What should we do now? Should we find me?”

“Maybe.” Professor Dlaun replied. “I________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.”

Professor Xoi nodded. “________________. Either way, we need to get away from here.” He signaled their immediate vicinity which was along a street with cars passing by every so often. Thankfully, none had passed by when the three climbed out of the window.

Samantha took in their surroundings and then froze when her eyes set on the street sign. “Uh, we may ‘ave a problem here.” She stated. “My cousin lives on this street - at least if this dimension is the same as ours.” She paused. “And we don’t get along.”

“Sammy!” A rotund man with what could only be described as a beer belly came around the corner walking a tiny white fluff ball of a dog on a hot pink leash just as Samantha finished speaking. “I’m glad I ran into you!”

Samantha tensed and prepared to run. She was confused about Mason’s cheerful tone, as she had only ever heard him yelling at her even at formal social gatherings, and the fluff ball was nothing like the enormous pit bull Gobber he normally had with him, but maybe this was just a new tactic. 

“I forgot to give ya somethin’” he reached into his pocket as he stepped forward. Samantha was grateful when her two professors stepped between her and Mason. 

“Can it wait for another time?” Professor Xoi inquired. “We were having an important discussion.”

“Oh, yeah sure.” Mason looked a bit awkward. “‘s long as Sammy’s not worried ‘bout it right now. I forgot ta give her my half a the rent before she left for school.”

Samantha couldn’t believe her ears. Mason had _never_ given her money, ever. The very short period of time that she had lived with him, he had made her pay the entire rent as well as cover the expense of groceries and _his_ beer.

**20 October 2020**

It’s why she moved out so quickly after finishing community college and into the dorms. She would much rather live on campus than with Mason. ________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________

If Samantha had been unsure that this was an alternate dimension before, she sure wasn’t now. “Uh, yeah, just give it ta me next time…” Samantha paused. ________________________________Technically, it wasn’t her money - it was AD Samantha’s, so she _should_ tell AD Mason to give it to her later so that AD Samantha would get it. _But_ , Professor Xoi, Professor Dlaun, and herself were currently stuck in an alternate dimension with _no money_.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

You know what? Dimensional rifts didn’t sound fun. Samantha’s made do without before. She could help the professors figure this out. No dimensional rifts. Nope. No thank ya.

**21 October 2020**

As they walked away from Samantha’s cousin, Emilia got a sudden insight into Samantha’s family situation. It was none of her business so she wasn’t going to ask Samantha about her relationship with her cousin. 

“Soo…. that’s your cousin?” Greg asked, and Emilia sighed on the inside.

“Yes.” Samantha looked at Greg. “I think I like him better in this dimension though. In our home dimension, he owes me at least a grand.”

There was a pregnant pause where Emilia glared at her fiancé. Luckily, Samantha was oblivious to the tension between the engaged professors and redirected the group to focus on what’s important.

“Where are we going and how are we going to do it? We have no money,” Samantha pointed out. 

Emilia looked at Greg, and he nodded at her. “To find Dr. Lenox.”

Samantha looked at her like she was nuts.

“If AD Dr. Lenox is anything like Dr. Lenox from our dimension, he’s the best chance we have of figuring out what to do next.” Greg explained.

“And if he ain’t?” Samantha questioned.

Greg shrugged. “We go busking? Em can sing pretty well.”

“Thanks, but I think I’d rather see you go busking.” Emilia retorted. “Your dancing will definitely turn some heads, Greg.”

For sure,” Greg replied sarcastically, rolling his eyes. “Samantha, do you have any special talents for busking?”

Samantha got a faraway look on her face at Greg’s question. “I don’t have the tools for it here.” She replied in an odd monotone. 

Emilia looked at Greg in horror. ‘How does he keep stepping in landmines around her?’

Samantha began to become more lively and asked them the best way to find Dr. Lenox.

“His lab.” “My lab.” The professors replied simultaneously. 

“Well, hopefully, he _hasn’t_ had the accident that gave me the lab in this dimension. And hopefully, he is running the same experiments as in _our_ dimension,” Emilia continued. 

The three dimensional travelers focused their walking toward the college campus and more specifically the science buildings. Their walk was picturesque but fraught with danger--the danger of being seen, the danger of being questioned, the danger of the mark. This perilous journey took a little over a half-hour because all three of them were now terrified of meeting Samantha’s analogue and anyone else they knew. 

As if on cue, AD Samantha showed up right outside the lab building. Luckily, Greg had spotted her moments before she rounded the corner and dragged Samantha and Emilia behind a nearby stand of trees which was, luckily, just big enough to hide them all.

“Yeah,” AD Samantha was saying into a bright pink cellphone (at least her favorite color seemed to be the same), “I’m passing by the science labs now.” ________________ “Mm. Just let me call Mason and let him know I’ll be spending the night out - you know how he worries.”

Emilia glanced at Samantha ________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________Emilia ________________

AD Samantha giggled - flirtatious giggling. “Okay. Yeah, see you then, Kyle.”

Samantha blanched and stared at her AD self as if the world had just ended. “No way.” She mumbled. “No freakin’ way!” She shouted, Greg and Emilia covering her mouth as quickly as they could.

AD Samantha, ________________________________ headed toward the trees the three were hiding behind. “Kyle, I’ll call you back.”

Emilia ________________________________Greg ________________________________________________

She squealed, shouted “yes” and reached toward Greg, squishing Samantha between them. Greg put his arms around her too, and - thankfully - Samantha caught on and made herself as small as possible so Emilia and Greg would look like a couple celebrating their engagement and not two professors trying to hide a student. 

_________

________________________________AD Samantha’s face turned bright red as she slowly backed away. She ran so fast toward the entrance of the university, that she nearly left streaks of pink behind from her hot-pink backpack.

Samantha exploded. “SHE’S WITH KYLE! KYLE, THE BACKSTABBING TRAITOR OF A FRIEND THAT STOLE MY PAPER BEFORE I TURNED IT IN AND CHEATED ON SO MANY PEOPLE KYLE! I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT SHE’S SO DUMB TO DATE THAT-THAT--” Emilia grabbed Samantha and shook her gently, breaking the screaming fit.

Are you good now?” Emilia asked, after Samantha’s breathing calmed to a more normal rate.

“No.” Samantha replied, but nonetheless she was _much_ calmer than before.

“Well,” Greg said, trying to break the tension, “AD Mason’s a better person than Mason, so maybe AD Kyle is better than Kyle too.”

Samantha nodded. “He’d better be.”

After a moment, the three walked out from behind the trees and headed toward the lab building. Emilia l________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________Emilia didn’t know quite how to finish her thought.

_____ Greg nodded________________

Samantha ________________________________. “I get it. The name on the plaque isn’t Dr. Lenox. So he’s not in this lab in this dimension. Lot’s of things aren’t right ‘ere, so what’s the problem?”

Emilia pointed to the plaque which read _Dr. Milern_ “ _That’s_ the problem.”

Samantha shrugged. “I’ve never heard of Dr. Milern before, so I don’t get it.”

“Yes you have.” Greg replied. “You just didn’t know that was her last name.”

“‘Kay, so who is she?” 

“Do you remember hearing about the incident with the elephant, the lab rat, and a box of fireworks?” Emilia shivered just thinking about it. “Or the incident with a boa constrictor, and the women’s basketball team?”

“Oh, or the incident with the giraffe and the Provost’s not-so-secret stash of expensive wine?” Greg added.

By this point, Samantha’s eyes had grown round as saucers. “ _Her_?! You mean the _Incidents of Isabella_ is a real thing? I thought she was an urban legend?”

“Nope,” Greg replied. “ _She_ is a very real scientist with a very real insatiable curiosity. She gets more ethics violations than any other scientist I know. And it’s typically because of something that happened _on accident_ than any real intention.”

Emilia continued. “I did my undergrad with her. We had a great time as lab partners in the upper-division physics courses.”

__ Emilia ________________ Greg ________________________________________________________________

“Undergrad was _not_ fun with Isabella Milern or with Isaac Usher. Both of them were maniacs then that almost blew themselves and the school up on five separate occasions! I hated when you hung out with them. And no it was _not_ a jealousy thing!” Greg argued, continuing an old familiar argument that has been played out ever since Isabella got a job at Mānoa. 

“And I told you that her doctorate has calmed her down _a lot_.”

“How are the three incidents named calming down?” ________________

“She didn’t almost blow up the school on _any_ of those occasions,” was Emilia’s prompt reply.

The lab door opened. A woman with dark brown curly hair and dark skin stood in the open doorway. The three dimensional travelers froze in horror.

“What’s the ruckus out here?” The woman paused and recognized all three of the travelers. “Professor Dlaun,” she began very professionally, “why is there a tattoo on your face that wasn’t there two hours ago when you closed your lab for the day? And Professor Xoi, why on earth are you on campus? You were sent home to sleep by me and your fiancée.” The woman paused on Samantha. “Samantha, my favorite student. Where is the lab report you promised me would be finished the next time I saw you?”

“Isabella,” Emilia began.

“Dr. Milern, Professor.”

“Dr. Milern, by any chance did this lab used to be Dr. Lenox’s? And also, are you attempting to recreate any of his experiments?”

Dr. Milern’s jaw dropped. Her question was low and horrified. “How did you know?” 

Samantha bravely opened her mouth and squeaked. Her face turned a horrible shade of red and Emilia felt second-hand embarrassment for her. Emilia continued talking after she realized that Greg wasn’t even going to try to attempt talking to an AD colleague. 

“We aren’t from here.” Emilia gestured to the lab and asked, “Can we talk in the lab _far away_ from any buttons on the control panel?” The last part was glared at her fiancé. “It is kind of a sensitive situation.”

Dr. Milern thought it over for a moment and responded, “We’ll go to my office. I’m in the next hallway on the left.”

**22 October 2020**

Okay, so when AD Dr. Milern said she really was trying to recreate AD Dr. Lenox’s experiments, Greg thought that for sure they had actually made some progress. ________________Dr. Milern ________________________________________________ AD Dr. Milern ________________

But, no.

Not only was AD Dr. Milern ________________________________________________________________________________And AD Dr. Lenox was downright frightening.________________________________________________________________________________ AD Dr. Milern thought the three of them were successful ‘creations.’

Just great.

Gregory ________________________________________________________________________________ Em and Samantha________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________

Greg looked over at Em and at the horror and shock on her face. The shaking of her head confused him for a minute, but then he realized, _‘This wasn’t what she had been working on in their dimension.’_

AD Dr. Milern droned on in her excitement while Greg came to the horrifying conclusion that AD Greg might be autopsying him and his two companions to study what made them different. Then Samantha spoke.

“You think _you_ created us? Is this another prank Dr. Milern? You are known for them after all,” the young woman spoke confidently.

Dr. Milern froze in shock. Greg parsed the look on her face as… offended?

“I beg your pardon? I have never pulled a prank in my life,” condescension dripped from every syllable toward the college student.

“Oh so the _Incidents of Isabella_ aren’t a thing here? Darn, I really enjoyed the story about the student fair with the mongooses and the rampaging balloon animals. Yo, prof what’s your favorite _Isabella Incident_?” Samantha directed her question at Em.  
Em responded with the story that always gave Greg nightmares after it rose from the repressed parts of his memory.

“The time in undergrad where we dropped items that we shaped or painted into brick-looking things off the top of the tallest building on campus to record what gravity did to the various items.”

“________________”

Greg cut in, “Because they almost killed me and two professors because the three amigos forgot to mark the drop area.”

AD Dr. Milern interrupted story time with, “I didn’t do undergrad with Professors Dlaun and Xoi. I went to Yale.”

“Yale?!” Em exclaimed. “You _always_ thought that the Yaleians were stuck-up prigs! What the heck Bella!”

AD Dr. Milern was now looking furious.

And confused.

And _furious_.

________________________________ picking up the office telephone and dialing. “Dr. Lenox,” She spoke - or yelled rather - into the receiver, “What did you do?!”

Greg________________ Em. ________________________________________________Samantha ________________________________ Dr. Milern ________________. 

“________________” Samantha ________________________________

“________________” Em ________________________________________________ Greg hoped, before the creepy black tentacles would start shooting out of Em’________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________Dr. Milern’________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.

________________________________________________________________________________________________. ________________. 

AD Dr. Lenox ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Greg barely heard Samantha’s broken horrified whisper of “Kyle?” before he could no longer see the lab anymore. 

“Where are we?” Em groaned. ‘Her recovery time is getting faster.’ Greg thought.

Greg looked around after ensuring that only Samantha and Em were in the party. He did not want to travel dimensions with the crazy doctors they were just with. The landscape was sparse but with trees. Trees that seemed familiar somehow….

______________________________________________________________________!

“We are in Africa. We need to figure out the task so we can go home,” Greg said confidently.

“And how exactly do we do that?” Em replied, her question serious but her tone was sassy.

**23 October 2020**

“Retrace our steps?” Greg asked more than stated. “Maybe we were sent to the place where we were supposed to find our task when we first arrived.”

Em nodded. “I don’t have very clear memories of that time since I was unconscious for most of it, so the two of you will have to lead the way.”

Em glanced at Samantha who was sitting on the ground, not participating in the conversation. Greg followed her gaze. The young woman seemed truly traumatized this time.________________.

________________________________

Em nodded and the two went over to kneel by Samantha’s side.

________________Samantha?” Em’s gentle voice could have calmed an angry gorilla in Greg’s opinion.

Samantha looked up at the two professors. “I quit.” 

Greg exchanged confused glances with Em._____

“I said,” Samantha repeated a bit louder, “I quit. This freakin’ thing’s gone TOO far now, and I ain’t dealin’ with it no more! _KYLE_ of all people! An’ now we’re back in FRIGGIN’ AFRICA! An’ what’re we ta do ‘ere? FIGURE IT OUT?!” Her frantic shouting calmed down at the end. “I quit.”

“Samantha,” Em placed a hesitant hand on the young woman’s shoulder. “________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.”

Greg nodded. “________________________________________________________________________________Em ________________________________.” Though he said that, he _really_ didn’t want to do so. He hoped his hesitance didn’t come through in his words though, for Samantha and Em’s sakes.

________________Samantha laughed - a strained laugh, but a laugh. “Good cop, sarcastic cop?” She stood up and pulled her hot pink buck knife out of her pocket. “Alrighty, then, let’s go.”

________________eventually the group reached the cabin________________________________________________ in Africa. It was just as dilapidated as Gregory remembered it. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________  
After thoroughly searching inside and out twice, Gregory was almost ready to give up, ________________Em’s depressed look and Samantha’s increasing agitated muttering________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Em” ________________________________

____________________________________

________________

______

______

__________

________

_____

________________

________________________________________________

__________________________Samantha______

“The mark glows.” Em and Samantha looked at him like he was an idiot.

________________

________________ Gregory grabbed Em and pulled her back and forth a few times while Samantha watched.

___

________________________________

________________Gregory________________________________“It glows a little bit when you move here and fades when you move back.”

________________________________Em___________

________________Professor Dlaun’s mark is acting like a metal detector.” Samantha did not look amused. “Accept its telling us where to go instead of where pennies got stuck in the sand.”

**24 October 2020**

________________ Samantha ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________She knew that her professors already thought that she was cracking under the strain of this dimensional adventure, which she was, but she was trying to actively lie to herself. It wasn’t working very well. 

When Samantha looked up, both of her professors were looking at her in concern. It was uber creepy with the glowing mark next to Professor Dlaun’s eyes full of concern. ‘I really hope that I am not in the horror movie trope. I would be the one to live. The professors are dating and I’m a single and intelligent female. Crap,’ “I _will_ be the traumatized survivor at the end of this won’t I?”

“What was that Samantha?” Professor Xoi asked. 

“Um...I got side-tracked with horror movie--” Professor Dlaun finished Samantha’s thought, upping the creepy factor by at least 10.

“________________” Professor Dlaun ________________________________________________ Samantha ___. Professor Dlaun’________________________________________________________________________________

Samantha ________________________________ Professor Dlaun. ________________ Professor Xoi ________________________________________________. Professor Dlaun ________________

Samantha and Professor Xoi exchanged an uncomfortable glance. Luckily for Samantha, Professor Xoi’s relationship mandated him to explain exactly _why_ Samantha could not bear to look at her favorite professor. 

“I look CREEPY?!” Professor Dlaun yelled. “ME EXPRESSING EMOTIONS LOOKS _CREEPY_?!”

“Yes.” came Professor Xoi’s blunt answer. He sighed and continued, “The faster that we complete this task, the faster the mark is no longer on your face, making you look creepy.”

“Fine. Guide me,” she ordered him. 

Professor Xoi took Professor Dlaun by the hand and began guiding her around the dilapidated cabin, glancing back and forth between where they were going and Professor Dlaun’s forehead… and her lips if Samantha’s eyes weren’t deceiving her ________________________________________________

________________________________

________________, Samantha followed the professors about, hot pink buck knife in hand. They trekked from the dilapidated cabin out to a dried up well that Samantha remembered checking ________________________________before sending Professor Xoi to the river for water. As the trio approached the well, Professor Dlaun’s mark glowed really, really brightly and a black tendril shot out and down to the bottom of the well before pulling something small out and dropping it into Professor Xoi’s hands.

“Oh, great, now we’re fishing.” Samantha rolled her eyes. “What did the tendril yank out o’ the well?”

Professor Xoi didn’t answer. He was staring at the object in his hands with a look of pure horror on his face. Samantha had a hard time understanding this since to her it just looked like a box. A fancy wood box in surprisingly good condition, but still a box.

**25 October 2020**

The box looked like a simple puzzle box, but Greg knew better. ________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Whatever you do, you _will_ not open that box,” he said, startling Samantha with his tone and snatching Em out of the trance that she was in just _looking_ at the box and causing her to pick it up. 

“What’s in there?” Samantha asked. ________________________________

“No! Don’t open the box!” Greg shouted, grabbing the box back from Em. 

___ Em ________________________________________________________________________________________________

Greg had a white-knuckle two-handed grip on the box. He looked down at it to make sure that he couldn’t open it with his tight hold. He looked up at the women with him and let out a deep heavy sigh at the looks on their faces. He knew he had to explain. He did _not_ want to tell this story. He had to anyway.

“It begins in World War II. Many of my family members and people from my hometown were stationed on the African front. They would tell a story of a devil box. A box so beautiful and complex that you just _had_ to try and open it. No one in their camp could open it, so it stayed on the commander’s desk, waiting for an unsuspecting curious fool to open it and release the horrors inside. 

“________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“He opened it that night,” Greg’s voice was hoarse and haunted in his retelling of the story. His eyes were staring blankly past Samantha and Em, but they were riveted to his face.

“Every man in that camp had the same nightmare; the man who opened the box was eaten by a monster inside. No one ever saw that man again. This was a bad thing because he was the best mechanic at the camp ________________________________________________

“My great-grandfather drew the box in a letter back home to my great-grandma. That letter was sent out before the box was opened. He told my great-grandma in a later letter to never let him see that picture again if he made it back home. He told her the box was a curse and that no one should ever know of it ever again. Great-grandfather made it home, but closed wooden boxes were not allowed in his house _ever_. Many of the men he served with had the same reaction. All the stores in our town refused to sell closed-top wooden boxes ever again.”

Greg’s voice stopped. He was lost in the memory of him bringing an innocent puzzle box into his great-grandparent’s home. His great-grandfather was furious and destroyed the box. Greg was heart-broken, then his great-grandma told him the story of the puzzle box and showed him the letters. Greg understood then and he acquired his great-grandfather’s fear.

Samantha’s voice broke into his thoughts. “What happened to the original box?”

“That box?” Greg let out a bit of nervous laughter. “The next day, the mechanic’s sergeant reported him missing. A search party had gathered for the mechanic. No one would believe that he would go AWOL. He loved working on engines too much. The search party found the box, intact but closed. Nearby was the mechanic’s tags. Everyone knew then that the camp-wide nightmare was _true_. Every man in that camp attempted to destroy that box. Nothing worked. They eventually threw it down a defunct well. And then blew the well shut.” There was a long pause. “It was probably this well. Though this well seems very open to me.”

**26 October 2020**

“Well, maybe in _our_ dimension they did blow it shut.” Em supplied. “But in _this_ dimension it wasn’t blown shut for whatever reason.” ________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________Samantha cut in, opening her hot pink buck knife to expose the blade as she did so. “We gotta destroy that people-eating-monster-thingy.”

“NO!” Gregory jerked back and started sprinting away from Samantha as fast as he could. He would drown the box in the river before letting anyone open it.

**27 October 2020**

**28 October 2020**

**29 October 2020**

**30 October 2020**

**31 October 2020**

“So why can’t we destroy the monster?” Emilia asked, confused by Greg’s increased paranoia about the box.

“The box will kill us if we open it. If we open it the monster will eat us. No opening the box!” Greg finished, panting with the effort to communicate this message.

Emilia looked at Samantha and then back at Greg, confused at his insistence. Emilia looked closer at Greg’s eyes. They didn’t look like the soulful brown that she would gaze at when she thought he wasn’t looking. They looked darker, more sinister. ‘Did the monster leave the puzzle box already and infect Greg? Or is this an AD Greg that I don’t even know anymore?’

Emilia made a quick list of questions that she needed to ask Greg to verify his identity:  
1\. When did they meet? They met in freshman year in college in their first class.   
2\. Where did Greg propose? Trick question-Em proposed after Greg couldn’t finish the question while on one knee.  
3\. Who is Emilia’s best friend that isn’t Greg? Isabella  
4\. What did Emilia blow up in undergrad? Nothing. _Emilia_ didn’t move to explosions with Isabella until their Master’s work.  
5\. What was Emilia’s first impression of Samantha? She was very enthusiastic for a morning class.  
6\. Who is Emilia’s most annoying student? Samantha (not anymore, but traveling dimensions tends to change student-teacher relationships and impressions.

Emilia paused in her list making.

This couldn’t be AD Greg. AD Greg and AD Emilia had both come into their house earlier, and Greg was with her the entire time. Which meant…

Sure enough, there was a crack in the box.

Apparently, the original box ate people, but the AD box possesses people instead - and the AD box used Greg’s knowledge of the box to trick Emilia and Samantha.

“Hey Professor Dlaun,” Samantha broke Emilia out of her thoughts. “The box is cracked.”

Emilia nodded, “the AD box possesses people.”

Greg - Possessed Greg really - looked at the two for a moment and began to run. Emilia felt a hot, tingling sensation that she was finally able to identify as the mark’s power activating, and she tried hard to focus on the AD box rather than Greg. Above all, she didn’t want to hurt Greg, and, since Possessed Greg had been protective over the AD box, it followed that the AD box was it’s core anyway.

Still, her control over the mark wasn’t great. If Greg kept moving about like that - she wasn’t sure she could avoid hitting him.

“Samantha,” I need you to stop Greg from running - NOW.” She shouted to her student.

Samantha nodded and took off after Greg and the AD box.

Emilia ________________________________t Samantha________________________________________________________________________________launch herself off the ground, grab a tree branch, and swing herself on top of possessed Greg.

As the two crashed to the ground, Possessed Greg lost his grip on the box, and it skidded about a foot away.________________Greg________________Samantha ________________Emilia released the mark’s power. The black tendrils whipped toward the box, and Possessed Greg let out a howl of pain as the box shattered into a million pieces.

________________Greg mumbled “Samantha, ________________

________________ Samantha pulled his head up while remaining in a kneeling position on his back. Emilia rushed over to check his eyes for signs of possession, not wanting Greg stuck in that uncomfortable, and probably painful, position any longer than necessary.

________________________________________________________________________________black tendrils swarmed out from the mark faster than ever before, surrounding her, Greg, and Samantha rapidly. 

Emilia felt a sense of disorientation and swirling motion, making her want to throw up. The heat on her forehead intensified and the tendrils closed in so tightly that she couldn’t see. It felt like hours passed before the blackness dissipated and the feeling of motion stopped.

“Em?” Emilia heard Greg’s ________________________________________________________________ Greg was barely a foot away with Samantha still on his back, but they weren’t in the African forest anymore. They were back in the lab. Not the creepy human transmutation lab. This was the button-that-should-not-have-been-pressed-was-pressed-and-everything-started-shaking-and-we-were-transported-across-dimensions lab.

________________________________

________________, Greg ________________________________________________those beautiful brown eyes that she loved. 

“You okay, Em?”

“________________

________________Samantha asked, face looking pale and mildly green.

“________________________________ Emilia finished replying, Samantha jumped off Greg and ran to a nearby trash can that had toppled over, righted it, and wretched.

“I hate dimensional travel.” Samantha groaned.

Greg, ________________________________ Em ________________ he pulled her into a bear hug. “________________Em. ________________

________________ We’re home now.”

“________________Greg ________________ her forehead. “The mark’s gone.”

________________________________________________________________________________________________Em knew they would be okay.

The End.


End file.
